LIBRARY  OF  THE  THEOLOGICAL  SEMINARY 

PRINCETON.  N.  J. 


PRESENTED  BY 

Yale  Divinity  School  Library 

BX  8495    .H38  P73  1883 
Prentice,  George,  1834- 
The  life  of  Gilbert  Haven 


[ 

Digitized  by 

the  Internet  Archive 

in  2014 

https://archive.org/details/lifeofgilberthavOOpren 


THE  LIFE     ^  ^ 

GILBERT  HAYE^\ 

BISHOP  OF  THE  ]I£THODIST  EPISCOPAL  CHrRCH. 


BY 


OEORG-E  PRETsTTICE,  D  D., 


Professor  in  Wesleyan  University. 


NEW  YORK : 
PHILLIPS    <k  FIUNT 

CINCINNATI  : 
WALDEN     &  STOWE. 
1883. 


Copyright  1883,  by 

i=':Ea:iniji_ii:ps  ^  hxj^t. 

New  York, 


TO 

j^T^jj  HIS  ki:s's:me:n-, 

NATURAL    AND  SPIRITUAL, 
THIS 

LIFE  OF  GILBERT  HAVEN 

RESPECTFULLY  DEDICATED. 


PREFACE. 


WHEN  GILBERT  HAVEN  was  appointed  a  missionary  at 
Vicksburg  he  did  not  think  he  should  return  from  that  work 
alive.  He  therefore  consulted  the  writer  as  to  his  readiness  to  pre- 
pare such  an  account  of  Mr.  Haven's  views  and  conduct  as  might 
vindicate  his  memory  before  the  Church.  Hence  all  the  letters  and 
documents  relating  to  that  transaction  were  put  into  the  writer's 
hands.  Several  friends  suggested  that  in  case  Mr.  Haven's  fears 
turned  out  correct,  a  biography  would  be  required.  In  this  contin- 
gency that  task  was  to  be  performed  by  the  same  hands. 

It  came  to  be  understood  in  the  family  of  bishop  Haven  that,  in 
the  event  of  his  death,  any  biography  required  should  be  prepared 
by  the  writer,  with  the  aid  of  L.  T.  Townsend,  D.D. 

When  Bishop  Haven  died  the  call  for  a  biography  was  very  gen- 
eral. Two  well  known  editors  and  one  college  president  offered  their 
services  for  the  preparation  of  such  a  work.  It  was  every-where 
assumed  that  such  a  life  must  be  carefully  portrayed.  Hence  the 
literary  executors  thought  themselves  bound  to  undertake  their 
appointed  task.  When  a  very  imperfect  life  was  issued  by  a  Boston 
firm,  the  only  option  was  to  let  that  book  have  the  field  or  to  try  to 
produce  something  different. 

The  materials  for  such  a  volume  are  so  ample  and  interesting 
that  some  features  of  the  book  were  determined  thereby.  All  could 
not  be  used,  and  the  task  was  to  select  and  combine  such  matter  as 
would  best  tell  the  story  and  illustrate  the  traits  of  Gilbert  Haven. 
The  choice  of  these  materials  has  not  been  easy,  nor  can  one  flatter 
himself  that  in  all  cases  the  best  selection  has  been  made. 

The  private  correspondence  of  Bishop  Haven  is  rich  and  abun- 


4 


Preface. 


dant.  It  was  once  the  plan  to  publish  many  of  these  private  letters. 
To  have  done  so  in  any  satisfactory  way  would  have  doubled  the  size 
of  the  volume  without  doubling  its  interest.  This  conviction  led  to 
a  reluctant  abandonment  of  this  part  of  the  plan.  Twenty-five  or 
thirty  years  hence  an  interesting  volume  could  be  made  out  of  these 
letters  if  well  edited. 

The  writer  thanks  the  various  friends  of  Bishop  Haven  for  per- 
mission to  use  any  letters  of  his  in  their  possession  in  aid  of  this 
work.  Such  thanks  are  especially  due  to  various  members  of  Mr. 
Haven's  family;  to  his  brothers-in-law,  Richard  Ingraham,  Esq., 
W.  M.  Ingraham,  Esq.,  and  H.  C.  M.  Ingraham,  Esq. ;  and  to  Drs. 
William  Rice,  F.  H.  Newhall,  G.  M.  Steele,  D.  Steele,  A.  S.  Hunt, 
S.  F.  Upham,  and  W.  F.  Mallalieu. 

To  Bishop  Haven's  family  at  Maiden  great  credit  is  due  for  the 
care  and  patience  with  which  his  papers  have  been  put  into  shape 
for  convenient  use.  The]^;  have  lightened  many  a  burden  for  the 
biographer. 

Finally,  to  my  true  yoke-fellow,  Professor  L.  T.  Townsend,  D.D., 
of  Boston  University,  thanks  are  due  for  important  suggestions  and 
most  friendly  aid. 

Weslevan  University,  December  22,  1882. 


NOTE  FROM  PROFESSOR  L.  T.  TOWNSEND,  D.D. 

Professor  Prentice  and  myself  were  appointed  in  charge  of  all  the 
literarv*  effects* of  the  late  Bishop  Gilbert  Haven.  It  was  understood 
at  first  that  the  life  of  the  Bishop  was  to  be  written  by  us  in  con- 
junction. The  plans  were  subsequently  changed,  and  the  present 
volume,  with  the  consent  of  all  parties,  is  exclusively  the  production 
of  Professor  Prentice. 

The  faithfulness  with  which  the  work  has  been  done,  and  the  lit- 
erary' excellence  characterizing  it,  will  certainly  be  acknowledged  by 
every  reader. 

Luther  T.  Townsend. 

Boston,  December  10,  1882. 


C  O  NTENT  S. 


CHAPTER  I. 
BEGINNINGS. 

Birth  and  Parentage — Home  Life — Maiden  and  its  Environments — 
Youthful  Traits— First  School  and  Teach(ir— The  Mother's  Influence- 
Miss  Goodwin  and  Master  Allard — Defense  of  a  Negro  Schoolmate — The 
Mother's  Counsel — Public  Sentiment  concerning  Colored  People — Theo- 
dore Parker's  Way — Gilbert  Haven  a  Clerk — Makes  Friends — Reading 
and  Study   Page  13 


CHAPTER  H. 

SCHOOL  LIFE. 

At  Wilbraham — The  School — His  Studies — Companions — Attitude  to- 
ward Religion — Good  Traits  and  Bad — Bethiah's  Sickness — A  Revival 
in  School — Haven's  Conversion — Joy  and  Fidelity — End  of  the  Term — 
Happy  Thanksgiving  ,   27 


CHAPTER  HI. 

BUSINESS  AND  STUDY. 

At  Home — Business  in  Boston — Begins  a  Journal — Its  Value — Petty 
Vexations — Becomes  a  Clerk  at  Tenney's — His  City  Home — Trials  and 
Success  as  Clerk — Estimate  of  him  by  Employer  and  Associates — Relig- 
ious Life — Religious  Home — Preachers  Heard — Social  Meetings— Piety — 
Temptations — Study  of  Greek  and  Geometry — Rev.  William  Rice — Read- 
ing— Returns  to  Wilbraham — Preparation  for  College   37 


6 


Contexts. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

COLLEGE. 

Enters  Wesleyan  University — First  Impressions — Extra  Studies — Beau- 
tiful Middletown — Dr.  Wliedon — Dr.  Olin's  Influence — Dr.  Smith — Ardor 
in  Work — Standing  in  Class — The  Junior  Exhibition — The  Eclectic  So- 
ciety— Reading — College  Friends — Class  Pride — Gentleness  in  Judgment 
— Opinion  of  Himself — Teaching  in  Saugus — The  Rice  Household — F.  H. 
Newhall — Social  Life — A  Revival — Emerson  at  Middleto^^Tl — Emerson's 
Influence — Lectures  Heard— Prospects — Graduation  Page  50 

CHAPTER  V. 
TEACHER  AND  PRINCIPAL. 

Amenia  Seminary — Teaching  Greek — His  Associates — Social  Life — Out 
of  Doors — Made  Principal — Success  and  Difficulties — Growth  in  Scholar- 
ship —  Reading  —  Theology  —  The  Life  Spiritual  —  His  Vocation  —  First 
Preaching — License  to  Preach — Vacation  Days  and  Society — Death  of 
Friends — Leaves  Amenia   79 


CHAPTER  VI. 
NORTHAMPTON. 

Joins  Conference — Stationed  at  Northampton — Reads  Edwards — The 
Place  and  his  Work — Salary — Becomes  one  of  the  School  Committee — 
A  Debt  Paid — Value  of  this  Experience — Letter  to  Rev.  A.  Gould— Mar- 
riage— Love  and  Courtship— The  Wedding  Journey— The  Northampton 
Paradise — Mrs.  Haven — Letters   106 


CHAPTER  VII. 
WILBRAHAM. 

The  Ipswich  Conference— Full  Connection— Sent  to  Wilbraham— The 
First  Service— Early  Preaching— Preparation  for  the  Pulpit— Advice  to  a 
Minister — Spiritualism — A  Seance — Pastor  Haven  with  the  Young — Mis- 
sionary Spirit — Judson's  Example — Birth  and  Death  of  the  First  Child — 
New  Friends   130 


Contents. 


7 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

WESTFIELD. 

Ordained  Elder— Stationed  in  Westfield— Letter  to  Hunt—Difficulties 
in  Westfield— Haven  and  Trafton— Despondency  about  Preaching— Peril 
of  Scandal— Westfield  News— Father  Cadwell— A  Son  Born— A  Glimpse 
of  Home  Life— Address  at  Middletown— An  Invitation   146 

CHAPTER  IX. 

THE  TRIANGLE. 

Successive  Friendships— Characteristics  as  a  Friend— The  Triangle— 
The  Three  Angles— G.  Haven,  F.  H.  Newhall,  G.  M.  Steele— The  Fourth 
Angle,  D.  Steele— Fun  and  Work— Letter  from  the  'Cute  Angle  162 

CHAPTER  X. 

ROXBURY  AND  CAMBRIDGEPORT. 

Roxbury  and  Cambridgeport — The  Great  Revival — Haven's  Work  as 
Pastor — Trip  to  Eastham — The  White  Mountains — Life  and  Love  at  Flood 
— A  Daughter  Born — Sad  Forebodings — Death  of  Mary  Haven   176 

CHAPTER  XL 

MARY     IN  HEAVEN. 

Gilbert  and  Mary  Haven — The  Happy  Past — Present  Desolation — Re- 
sponse to  Sympathy — Chaplain  Haven — A  Blue  Letter — Shyness  of  his 
Grief — The  Memorial  Days — Artistic  and  Real  Sorrow  Contrasted — Con- 
solation  192 

CHAPTER  XII. 

CHAPLAIN  HAVEN. 

Chaplain  of  the  Massachusetts  Eighth  Regiment — Fidelity  and  Success 
— War  on  Camp  Vices  —  Incidents — Camp  Essex — Talk  with  Slaves — 
Jupiter  in  Disguise — Carrollton  Manor — Arlington — Gnats  and  Camels — 
Conversations  about  Slavery  with  Methodists — Camp  Andrew — The  Bal- 
timore Preachers'  Meeting — Baltimore  and  its  Methodists — Preaching — 
Torrey's  Prison — Haven's  Courage — His  Criticisms   2ig 


8 


Contents. 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

NEWARK. 

Clinton-Street— His  Faith— Works— Methodist  Polity—"  The  Method- 
ist " — Ecclesiastical  Reactions  of  the  War — Returns  to  the  New  England 
Conference   241 


CHAPTER  XIV. 
IN  EUROPE. 

Travels  in  Europe  —  Correspondence  —  Dr.  Cumming  —  Punshon  and 
Spurgeon— Palmerston  and  Disraeli— Wayside  Talks— Caste  in  the  Grave 
—St.  Germain  Des  Fres— Letter  to  the  London  Watchman— Its  Reception 
in  England     248 


CHAPTER  XV. 
BOSTON. 

Stationed  in  Boston — The  North  Russell  Street  Church — Social  Meetings 
— Preaching — Spiritual  Life — Literary  Work — Purchase  of  Grace  Church 
— Business  Tact— Grace  Church  Re-opened — A  Call  and  Half  a  Call — 
Buries  his  Father — Letter  to  W.  M.  Ingraham — The  Church's  Work  in 
the  South — Letter  to  Bishop  Ames — Letter  from  Bishop  Ames — The  Con- 
script Missionary's  Perplexities — Further  Correspondence — Bishop  Thom- 
son's Courtesy — Serious  Illness — Approval  of  his  Conscience — Bad  Health 
— Idleness — Improvement   266 


CHAPTER  XVL 

THE  REFORMER. 

Early  Abolitionism  —  Incident  at  Amenia  —  Sermon  on  the  Fugitive 
Slave  Bill — Political  Preaching — The  Caste  Spirit — Breadth  of  his  Views 
—  Prophetic  Spirit — Defense  of  John  Brown — Moral  Insight — ^John  A.  An- 
drew— Their  Relations — Defends  Governor  Andrew — Condemns  him — 
Criticism  of  Public  Men — Letter  to  Governor  Claflin — Supports  the  Third 
Party   289 


Contents. 


9 


CHAPTER  XVII. 

THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS. 

Literary  Career — Defective  Training — Faults  of  Style-^Writing  for 
Newspapers — Pictures  of  War  and  Slavery — Dr.  Cuyler — "  I^ife  of  Father 
Taylor" — "The  Pilgrim's  Wallet,"  and  "Our  Next-Door  Neighbor" — 
The  "  National  Sermons"  Page  316 

CHAPTER  XVIII. 

THE  EDITOR. 

Editor  of  "  Zion's  Herald  " — His  Policy  and  Aims — Editorial  Work — 
New  Writers  for  the  "Herald" — The  Change — Work  of  the  Religious 
Editor — Veuillot's  Statement — Skill  in  Editorial  Comment — Notices  of 
Books — Reforms,  Popular  and  Unpopular — War  on  Rationali>m  and  Uni- 
tarianism — The  Return  Fire — General  Result — Pet  Themes — A  Journalis- 
tic Device — A  Lively  Paper — Illustrations  of  his  Wit — "  Brilliant  but  Use- 
less"— "All  Head" — "Experience  Telling" — "Poor  Laird" — An  Invi- 
tation Declined — His  Criticism  of  Secular  Journals — Lay  Representation 
—Politics— "  Herald"  Criticised,  but  Successful— Call  to  the  "Boston 
Traveller,"  and  "  The  Independent  "    334 

CHAPTER  XIX. 

HAVEN  IN  CONFERENCE. 

A  Genial  Critic— Position  in  Conference — Devotion  to  Christian  Truth 
—Fidelity  to  Methodism— His  Vivid  Convictions— Relations  with  Re- 
formers—Administrative Ability— Quick  Perception  of  Talent— Wide 
Acquaintance  with  Men— In  the  General  Conference  of  1868— Election 
to  the  Bishopric  in  1872 — His  Consecration   j68 

CHAPTER  XX. 

BISHOP  HAVEN, 

Abundance  of  Information — His  Conferences — Traits  as  Presiding  Bish- 
op— Successes  and  Mistakes — Prejudices  against  Him— His  Preaching 

—At  the  Vineyard— His  Wit  Dreaded— His  Use  of  It— His  Aims  in  Cor- 
1* 


lO 


Contents. 


respondence  with  Papers — Oratava — Three  Sunsets — Accounts  of  Public 
Men — Sumner — Brownlow — Brother  Tate — Rebuke  of  Popular  Sins — 
Sermon  at  White  Earth — Wrongs  of  the  Indians — Their  Piety — Divorce 
— The  Sins  of  the  Pacific  Coast — The  Utah  Ulcer — New  Baltimore — The 
Newest  South  —  Sentiments  of  Southern  Methodist  Episcopalians — A 
No  Caste  Administration — Incidents — The  Tinted  Venuses — Letter  to  the 
*' Holston  Methodist" — A  Conference  in  a  Tent — Governor  Brown — A 
Southern  Heart  Touched — Hotel  Experience — A  Conductor's  Rudeness — 
Dines  with  a  Colored  Gentleman  in  Atlanta — Echoes — The  Renomination 
of  Grant — His  Courage,  not  Physical  but  Moral — Hotel  Proscription — 
Danger  of  Violence — Newspaper  Abuse — His  Confidence  in  Grant's  States- 
manship— More  Hotel  Proscription — Peremptory  Conductor — Distrust  of 
Hayes — The  Chisholm  Funeral — The  Scene  and  the  Preacher — Discourse 
— Education  in  the  South — An  Appeal — His  Interest  in  the  Schools — 
Boston  University — Will  of  Isaac  Rich — Trustee  of  Wesleyan  University 
— Founds  the  Mexican  Mission — Report  of  his  Mexican  Tour — Visits  Li- 
beria— A  Kruman — Trees — The  Witch  Home — Witch  Detection — A  Mod- 
ern Hero — The  Negro  in  Liberia — Henry — The  Conference — Compari- 
sons and  Questions — Missionary  Graves — Perils  in  the  Wilderness. ..  380 


CHAPTER  XXI. 
FAILING  HEALTH. 

Health— Perilous  Daring— Perfect  Health  on  the  Coast— The  Ice  Bolt 
— General  Condition— Resting— Clifton  Rest— The  End  Near— Pacific 
Coast  Trip— Last  Conference— The  Three  Warnings— His  Last  Meeting 
with  the  Bishops— Home— Last  Services— Sudden  Illness— Public  Sorrow 
and  Prayer— Rapid  Decline— Playfulness — The  Vain  Struggle— Reception 
I^ay — The  Departure  486 


CHAPTER  XXn. 
THE  MOURNING  AND  BURIAL. 

The  General  Sorrow — Action  of  his  Associates — Funeral — The  Throngs 
— Bishop  Foster's  Address — The  Procession — Burial  Service — Graduated 
with  Honor   5*^ 


Illustrations* 


Portrait  of  Bishop  Gilbert  Haven  Frontispiece. 

Birthplace  of  Bishop  Gilbert  Haven— Malden,  Mass.  .. Facing  15 

Boarding  House  and  Academy  Buildings.  Wilbraham, 
Mass   "  27 

Wesleyan  University,  Middletown,  Conn   "  51 

Amenia  Seminary,  Amenia,  N.  Y   "  79 

Late  Residence  of  Bishop  Gilbert  Haven,  and  Church 

FROM  which    he   WAS    BURIED  — M ALDEN,    MaSS   **  5H 


Con  segno  di  vittoria  incoronalo. 

—Dante,  Inf.,  Can.  IV,  54. 


LIFE  OF  GILBERT  HAVEN. 


CHAPTER  I. 


BEGINNINGS. 


Birth  and  Parentage — Home  Life  — Maiden  and  its  Environments — Youthful  Traits- 
First  School  and  Teacher— The  Mother's  Influence— Miss  Goodwin  and  Master  Allard— 
Defense  of  a  Negro  Schoolmate— The  Mother's  Counsel— Public  Sentiment  concerning 
Colored  People — Theodore  Parker's  Way— Gilbert  Haven  a  Clerk— Makes  Friends — 
Reading  and  Study. 


ILBERT  HAVEN,  JUN.,  the  fifth  of  the  ten  chil- 


dren  of  Gilbert  and  Hannah  Haven,  was  born  at 
Maiden,  Mass.,  September  19,  1821.  The  elder  Gilbert 
Haven  was  born  at  Framingham,  Mass.,  in  1 79 1,  and 
the  mother,  Hannah  Burrill,  was  born  in  1789  at  East 
Abington,  now  Rockland,  in  the  same  commonwealth. 
The  parents  were  married  in  Boston  September  5,  1811, 
by  Rev.  Charles  Lowell,  D.D.,  father  of  Lowell  the  poet. 
They  were  in  humble  worldly  circumstances,  but  of  hon- 
orable reputation.  The  large  family  which  grew  up 
around  them  was  diligently  trained  in  habits  of  piety 
and  industry.  The  father  retained  any  friends  he  had 
once  gained.  Like  some  of  his  ancestors,  he  was  elect- 
ed to  several  minor  offices  by  his  townsmen.  In  later 
years  he  held  a  position  in  the  Sub-treasury  at  Boston. 
Gilbert  had  a  very  high  opinion  of  his  father's  personal 


14 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


worth,  and  employed  every  suitable  opportunity  for 
showing  his  regard. 

The  mother  of  our  Gilbert  Haven  is  a  woman  of  un- 
usual good  sense  and  unaffected  piety.  She  was  early 
noted  for  her  great  interest  in  public  affairs,  and  as  a 
reader  of  many  books  and  periodicals,  traits  which  she 
still  exhibits  in  her  ninety-sixth  year. 

The  Haven  household  was  remarkable  for  the  strong 
and  tender  affection  of  its  members  for  each  other. 

The  marked  respect  and  sincere  affection  shown  by 
the  entire  circle  of  children  for  the  father  and  mother 
prove  how  lovingly  those  parents  had  .done  their  own 
part.  They  had  early  become  members  of  the  Method- 
ist Episcopal  Church  in  Maiden,  and  their  intelligence 
and  activity  had  rendered  them  useful  members.  The 
elder  Haven  was  one  of  the  most  honored  office-bearers 
in  the  local  society,  always  wise  in  counsel  and  generous 

*  The  brothers  and  sisters  of  Gilbert  Haven  are : 
Sarah  Oliver  Haven,  born  June  ii,  1812,  now  Mrs.  Lemuel  Cox. 
Elizabeth  Coolidge  Haven,  born  July  4,  18 14,  died  October  19,  1875, 
Hannah  Burrill  Haven,  born  September  13,  1816. 

Bethiah  Gardner  Haven,  born  January  4,  18 19,  died  December  27,  1839. 
Andrew  Jackson  Sprague  Haven,  born  October  10,  1823,  died  March 
12,  1834. 

Benjamin  Franklin  Haven,  born  March  4,  1826,  died  October  26,  1838. 

Wilbur  Fisk  Haven,  born  September  23,  1828,  died  March  11,  1872. 

Mary  Burrill  Haven,  born  September  21,  1830,  died  October  7,  1830. 

Anna  Storer  Haven,  born  March  31,  1832,  died  May  23,  1857. 

All  this  family  of  children,  except  the  eldest,  whose  birthplace  was 
Boston,  w^ere  born  in  Maiden.  All  that  are  dead  died  in  Maiden,  and  all 
who  live  live  in  Maiden.  Gilbert  Haven's  mother  is  proud  of  the  fact 
that  her  own  father,  Burrill,  served  in  the  Revolutionary  War. 


Beginnings.  15 

in  gifts.  It  is  worthy  of  noting  that  all  the  children 
who  grew  to  maturity  became  members  of  the  same 
Church,  and  all  who  have  died  in  adult  years  have  died 
in  the  triumphs  of  the  Gospel.  Thus  has  the  blessing 
of  God  long  rested  upon  that  devout  household. 

Gilbert  Haven  was  born  in  an  old-fashioned  two-story 
house,  at  the  end  of  a  lane  leading  from  the  foot  of 
Waitt's  Mount  to  a  stream  flowing  from  picturesque 
Spot  Pond,  and  turning  several  water-wheels  on  its  short 
journey  to  the  sea. 

The  house  then  stood  close  to  the  water's  edge,  the 
stream  expanding  there  into  a  small  pond,  thickly  beset 
with  trees,  in  an  exceedingly  rural  and  romantic  situa- 
tion ;  and  there  it  still  stands  in  its  beauty,  save  that 
the  stream  and  pond  have  been  filled  up,  trees  and 
bushes  cut  down,  and  houses  built  all  about  them  ;  so 
that  much  of  the  former  loveliness  of  the  scene  has  been 
destroyed. 

Maiden  lies  about  five  miles  due  north  of  Boston,  and 
has  a  very  picturesque  situation.  Young  Haven's  eyes 
must  have  early  grown  familiar  with  the  aspect  of  the 
distant  capital  city,  surmounted  by  the  swelling  dome 
of  the  State  House,  and  with  nearer  Charlestown, 
capped  with  the  rounded  crest  of  Bunker  Hill.  He  had 
only  to  climb  Waitt's  Mount  in  order  to  extend  his 
vision  on  the  south-west  to  classic  Cambridge,  where 
stood  Washington's  temporary  home,  soon  to  become 
doubly  dear  to  America  as  the  home  of  the  poet  Long- 
fellow ;  there,  too,  was  the  famous  elm,  whose  boughs 
once  shut  in  and  overarched  the  cradle  of  the  Nation  : 


i6  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

"  Never  to  see  a  nation  born 

Hath  been  given  to  mortal  man, 

Unless  to  those  who  on  that  summer  morn 

Gazed  silent  when  the  great  Virginian 

Unsheathed  the  sword,  whose  fatal  flash 

Shot  union  through  the  incoherent  clash 

Of  our  loose  atoms,  crystallizing  them 

Around  a  single  will's  unpliant  stem, 

And  making  purpose  of  emotion  rash. 

Out  of  that  scabbard  sprang,  as  from  its  womb, 

Nebulous  at  first,  but  hardening  to  a  star, 

Through  mutual  share  of  sunburst  and  of  gloom. 

The  common  faith  that  makes  us  what  we  are." 

If  he  turned  his  inquisitive  eyes  southward  they 
would  range  onward  to  well-famed  Dorchester  Heights. 
In  his  daily  sports  and  hasty  errands  he  could  often  see 
distinctly  enough  the  spire  of  the  old  North  Church, 
made  famous  by  Longfellow  and  Paul  Revere  as  the 
spot  where  the  light  of  warning  was  flashed  across 
the  imperiled  land  : 

"  He  said  to  his  friend,  If  the  British  march 
By  land  or  sea  from  the  town  to-night. 
Hang  a  lantern  aloft  in  the  belfr>'  arch 
Of  the  North  Church  tower  as  a  signal  light, 
One  if  by  land,  and  two  if  by  sea, 
And  I  on  the  opposite  shore  will  be, 
Ready  to  ride  and  spread  the  alarm 
Through  every  Middlesex  village  and  farm, 
For  the  country  folk  to  be  up  and  arm." 

Thus  he  could  hardly  set  his  foot  outdoors  without 
encountering  some  scene  which  recalled  proud  mem- 
ories of  a  still  recent  but  immortal  history.  Nor  could 
he  visit  many  of  the  neighboring  towns  without  coming 


Beginnings.  i/ 

upon  the  theater  of  imperishable  exploits  or  the  haunts 
of  heroic  minds.  His  very  surroundings  soon  taught  him 
the  high  lesson  that  life  comes  to  its  best  consecration 
only  when  turned  to  unselfish  uses. 

The  picturesque  scenery  which  lay  around  his  early 
home  must  have  aroused  his  native  sensibility  for  the 
beautiful  in  nature  to  an  unusual  degree,  since  we  en- 
counter abundant  traces  of  this  sensibility  in  his  earliest 
writings.  While  he  was  still  an  untraveled  boy  he  used 
to  conduct  visitors  to  the  long  line  of  hills  that  rises 
eastwardly  from  Maiden,  running  northward  toward 
Melrose,  that  they  might  drink  in  the  varied  glories  of 
a  vast  panorama,  composed  of  hills  and  vales,  dotted 
far  and  near  with  smiling  villages  and  majestic  cities, 
and  of  the  far-sweeping  fields  of  ocean,  bestrewn  with 
sunny  ships.  He  felt  an  intense  pleasure  in  the  delight 
which  the  sublime  scene  never  failed  to  provoke.  When 
he  had  visited  Scotland,  Spain,  Italy,  Greece,  and  Switz. 
erland  he  was  still  wont  to  say  that  five  minutes  from 
his  mother's  door  stood  a  mount  of  vision  which  re- 
vealed a  scene  that  might  well  hold  its  own  among  the 
most  famous  landscapes  of  the  world.  No  man  could 
think  this  opinion  extravagant  who  had  slowly  turned 
his  own  eyes  over  that  splendid  array  of  beautiful  views. 
The  poet  Lowell  once  declared  of  a  similar  landscape 
but  a  few  miles  distant,  that  Italy  itself  had  nothing 
finer  to  offer. 

But  while  we  have  been  looking  around  the  region 
in  which  he  was  born,  we  have  left  the  hapless  babe 
just  arrived  there  on  September  19,  1821,  quite  to  him- 


1 8  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

self.  His  mother  describes  him  as  a  vigorous  child, 
energetically  kicking,  pushing,  and  driving,  while  yet  in 
her  lap  and  arms.  He  was  named  for  his  father,  simply 
Gilbert  Haven,  while  the  other  children  rejoiced,  some 
in  two  and  some  in  three  Christian  names.  Stoutly 
resenting  at  one  period  this  parsimony  toward  himself, 
he  wrote  himself,  and  required  others  to  write  him, 
Gilbert  R.  Haven.  When  asked  what  the  R.  might 
mean,  he  said  it  might  mean  rex,  rogue,  or  rascal ;  but 
he  finally  returned  to  Gilbert  Haven. 

From  such  accounts  of  his  boyish  days  as  have  come 
to  our  knowledge,  it  may  fairly  be  inferred  that  he  had 
a  far  better  and  more  comfortable  time  of  it  than  his 
fond  mother  did  during  his  boyhood.  There  was  an 
intense  fire  and  energy  in  his  character  which  found 
vent  in  all  sorts  of  childish  escapades.  He  drove  hoop, 
played  marbles,  fished,  swam,  skated,  climbed  trees,  and 
snowballed  with  a  spirit  that  sometimes  imperiled  life  or 
limb.  His  was  the  gift  of  leadership  even  in  such 
sports.  Such  a  child  inevitably  gives  the  maternal 
heart  many  a  startling  anxiety  and  panic  terror.  Yet 
somehow  the  good  providence  of  God  keeps  guard  over 
such  hare-brained  heroes  in  all  their  perilous  ways,  and 
brings  them  but  the  more  fully  to  man's  estate  for  their 
vehement  juvenile  proceedings.  If  possible  it  would 
be  most  profitable  to  learn  how  much  of  the  very  best 
training  of  such  boys  for  their  later  work  comes  from 
careful  teachers  and  watchful  parents,  and  how  much 
from  the  severer  but  self-appointed  tasks  of  childhood. 
The  latter  steady  the  nerves  and  string  the  muscles, 


Beginnings. 


19 


make  ear  and  eye  quick  and  wise,  and  gradually  turn 
reckless  daring  into  cool  and  alert  vigilance,  and  they 
have  the  notable  advantage  of  being  the  child's  own 
work  and  exclusive  responsibility.  Perhaps  Gilbert 
Haven  owed  more  than  most  men  do  to  such  voluntary 
discipline. 

Throughout  a  long  hfe  Gilbert  Haven  did  honor  to 
his  mother  for  the  care  and  love  which  she  unsparingly 
lavished  upon  him.  Few  men  have  ever  held  a  mother 
in  higher  regard  than  he  did  his.  A  long  series  of 
letters  to  her  show  the  unfailing  tenderness  of  his 
affection  for  her  and  his  interest  in  her  welfare.  How 
she  gained  her  strong  and  permanent  hold  upon  him  is 
best  revealed  in  the  accounts  which  creep  into  his  letters 
and  journals  of  early  scenes  in  his  life  in  which  hers  was 
the  central  figure.  As  a  specimen  of  many  such  pas- 
sages we  produce  one  from  a  letter  written  home  near 
the  close  of  his  college  life  : 

I  am  always  homesick  Sabbath  nights,  why  I  know  not,  unless 
the  memories  of  olden  days  come  rushing  up  more  powerfully  and 
vividly  than  at  other  times,  the  memory  of  remotest  hours  when  all 
of  us,  from  Sarah  to  the  littlest,  used  to  sit  and  sing  with  father,  and, 
after  he  had  gone  to  meeting,  read  the  Bible  (the  first  chapters  of 
Proverbs  for  me)  and  pray  with  you.  You  don't  know  how  deeply 
those  hours  and  acts  are  impressed  on  my  life.  ...  I  have  often 
wished  that  I  could  leap  back  with  the  other  girls  to  those  days  of 
babyhood,  and  live  and  laugh  away  my  days." 

Like  other  Massachusetts  towns,  Maiden  had  certain 
humble  temples  of  learning  which  the  law  requires  all 
children  and  youth  to  frequent.    One  of  these  stood 


20 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


nearly  opposite  the  present  Methodist  Episcopal  Church. 
It  was  afterward  known  as  the  "  old  brick  school-house," 
though  it  must  have  been  nearly  a  "  new  brick  school- 
house  "  when  young  Haven  first  entered  it.  When  four 
or  five  years  old  he  entered  the  lowest  of  the  three 
graded  schools  taught  there.  His  first  school-teacher 
was  a  certain  Miss  Dexter.  We  know  little  of  her,  but 
doubtless  she  duly  taught  the  bright-witted  youngster 
his  a  b  c's,  and  such  other  lore  as  suited  his  boyish 
capacity.  There  he  probably  heard  the  Bible  read  with 
reverence,  and  prayer  offered  in  the  terms  known  as  the 
Lord's  Prayer.  Whether  Miss  Dexter  ruled  her  humble 
kingdom  through  fear  or  kindness  is  unknown.  With 
such  devices  for  disturbing  infant  schools  as  the  infant 
mind  is  so  fertile  in  devising,  it  would  be  no  wonder  if 
she  had  ample  chance  for  exercising  all  her  Christian 
graces.  Whether  Gilbert  Haven  and  ]\Iiss  Dexter  were 
sworn  friends  or  sworn  foes  cannot  now  be  told,  nor  can 
it  be  well  conjectured  without  more  testimony  concern- 
ing that  young  lady. 

Miss  Martha  Goodwin  was  his  next  teacher.  Of  her 
only  this  is  on  record,  that  she  afterward  went  to 
Tuscumbia,  Alabama,  as  teacher,  and  there  became  wife 
to  Rev.  Chauncey  Richardson.  Whence  we  infer,  if 
the  Rev.  Chauncey  Richardson  chose  wisely,  that  Miss 
Goodwin  was  a  pious  person  of  good  teaching  abilities. 
This  inference  is  inevitably  shaded  with  some  uncer- 
tainty, since  we  have  no  vouchers  for  'Mr.  Richardson's 
discretion,  and  a  minister  in  love  is  as  blind  as  any 
other  mortal  man. 


Beginnings. 


21 


In  due  time  young  Haven  made  his  way  to  the 
highest  school  in  the  building  and  town,  taught  by  Mr. 
Allard.  Not  very  much  is  known  about  this  gentle- 
man. Probably  he  was  a  teacher  respectable  for  his 
knowledge  and  powers  of  communication.  In  his  room 
occurred  the  far-heralded  incident  of  young  Haven's 
defense  of  the  poor  colored  girl.  Among  Master 
AUard's  pupils  was  one  in  such  circumstances  as  to 
^appeal  strongly  to  his  care  and  sympathy.  She  came 
from  the  poor-house  to  the  school-house.  Probably  she 
had  been  used  only  to  hard  fare,  poor  raiment,  and 
disagreeable  companions.  In  New  England  people 
rarely  come  to  the  poor-house,  unless  they  have  been 
unusually  unfortunate  in  business,  vicious,  or  mentally 
weak.  The  child  was  probably  there  rather  through 
such  faults  or  misfortunes  of  her  kindred  than  her  own  ; 
but,  however  there,  her  condition  should  have  chal- 
lenged pity  and  respect.  To  complete  her  misery  she 
was  black  ;  her  very  hue  was  a  sign  that  spoke  against 
her  as  one  of  a  servile  race. 

Perhaps  Master  Allard  found  her  an  uneasy  and 
troublesome  pupil,  for  the  black  inmate  of  the  poor- 
house  may  have  been  wonted  to  greater  freedom  in  her 
movements  than  comported  with  good  order  in  school. 
On  one  occasion  he  punished  her  with  considerable 
severity.  We  do  not  know  her  offense,  nor  whether  the 
teacher  really  was  too  severe.  Little  Gilbert  Haven  had 
witnessed  the  scene  in  a  tumult  of  indignation  ;  he  felt 
every  swift  blow  as  if  its  sting  was  piercing  his  own 
flesh,  and  he  at  least  remembered  the  special  misfor- 


22 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


tunes  of  his  hapless  companion.  Hence  he  lingered 
after  school  to  fling  at  heedless  Master  Allard  the 
taunting  remark,  If  that  girl  had  not  been  from  the 
poor-house  and  black,  you  wouldn't  have  dared  to  whip 
her  as  you  did." 

From  childhood  till  the  close  of  life  he  was  fond 
of  rehearsing  to  his  mother,  in  her  humble  kitchen,  the 
events  of  his  daily  life,  and  asking  her  advice  about  any 
thing  which  troubled  or  perplexed  his  mind.  He, 
reported  this  incident  to  her  at  night,  and  awaited  her 
comments  with  interest.  She  flashed  out  the  honest 
and  indignant  declaration,  ''Gilbert,  that  little  black 
girl  is  just  as  good  as  you  are,  if  she  is  black,  and  you 
ought  to  take  her  part." 

This  authoritative  confirmation  of  his  own  instinctive 
opinion  relieved  him  of  any  rising  doubts  of  the  wisdom 
of  his  conduct  in  this  particular  case,  and  shed  great 
light  on  his  duty  in  similar  matters  of  social  wrong- 
doing. So  vigorous  was  his  protection  of  his  little 
black  schoolmate  from  the  poor-house  that  she  had  a 
much  easier  lot  under  the  changed  circumstances,  and 
the  wit  of  the  meaner  and  more  careless  lads  avenged 
itself  upon  him  by  styling  the  new  friend  Gil  Haven's 
wife."  This  incident  and  its  accompanying  lessons 
made  a  lasting  impression  on  his  mind.  He  used  to 
say  afterward  that  his  mother  and  the  Bible  had  made 
him  an  Abolitionist." 

Whether  the  taunt  flung  at  Master  Allard  was  merited 
or  not,  it  was  surely  a  high-hearted  little  champion  of 
twelve  that  tossed  it  into  the  teeth  of  his  own  school- 


Beginnings. 


23 


master.  Such  a  step  shows  not  only  a  deep-rooted 
instinct  for  justice  and  a  quick  sympathy  for  the  suffer- 
ing, but  it  shows  further  the  high  courage  which  always 
prompted  Gilbert  Haven  to  appeal  to  wrong-doers  them- 
selves against  their  own  wrong-doing. 

It  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  this  act  had  no 
prompter  but  the  boy's  own  heart.  The  agitation  con- 
cerning the  negro  and  his  rights  had  not  yet  gone  abroad 
much,  and  people  in  general  were  apathetic  about  the 
topic.  Within  a  year  of  this  act  of  heroism  another 
incident  befell  at  Newton  in  the  school  of  a  now  famous 
school-master,  Theodore  Parker,  which  deserves  to  be 
recited  in  order  to  illustrate  the  condition  of  the  public 
sentiment  of  that  day.  Mr.  Frothingham  tells  the 
story  thus : 

A  colored  girl  applied,  and  was  admitted  by  the  teacher  without 
misgiving ;  he  knew  no  distinction  of  persons,  but  the  parents  of  his 
other  pupils  did.  They  made  objections,  prophesying  injury  to  the 
school,  and  the  black  inmate  was  dismissed.  It  was  not  a  generous 
thing  to  do ;  on  the  contrary,  it  was  a  shabby  thing.  The  young 
man  confessed  it  afterward  with  mortification,  and  made  ample 
amends  to  her  persecuted  race  ;  but  it  was  pardonable  in  a  youth 
who  had  lived  in  the  seclusion  of  thoughts,  whose  conscience  had 
never  been  touched  by  the  wrongs  of  the  negro  North  or  South,  and 
who  regarded  race  merely  as  he  would  have  done  any  other  dis- 
turbing element. 

This  palliation  must  serve  for  Master  Allard  as  well 
as  Theodore  Parker;  but  plainly  Gilbert  Haven  was  not 
of  their  kind.  Another  incident  shows  that  boyish 
heedlessness  sometimes  prevailed  over  these  nobler  im- 


24 


Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 


pulses  in  such  matters.  As  a  respectable  colored  woman 
approached  a  group  of  boys,  of  whom  Gilbert  Haven 
was  one,  he  cried  out  rudely,  "  Boys,  I  think  there's 
going  to  be  a  shower  ;  I  see  a  thunder-storm  rising." 
The  woman  retorted,  Gilbert,  I  never  expected  to  hear 
any  thing  like  that  from  you  ! "  "  You  never  shall 
again,  auntie,"  was  his  response  ;  a  promise  he  sacredly 
kept.  When,  after  his  conversion,  he  was  serving  as 
clerk  in  a  Boston  store  a  companion  sneeringly  de- 
manded. Who  was  that  nigger  to  whom  you  gave  so 
much  attention  to-day  "  He  answered  gravely,  ''She 
was  my  sister."  This  rapid  intuitive  perception  of  the 
practical  bearing  of  his  own  oneness  in  Christ  with  all 
men  on  his  conduct  toward  them  was  the  key  to  his  en- 
tire relation  to  all  such  social  questions.  His  entire 
simplicity  was  perfect  wisdom  on  such  points. 

When  young  Haven  had  finished  his  studies  with 
Master  Allard,  it  seemed  best  that  he  should  be  put  to 
some  business  whereby  he  could  win  his  daily  bread. 
Accordingly  he  became  a  clerk  when  he  was  fourteen 
years  old,  in  the  dry-goods  store  of  Mr.  James  Richard- 
son, which  stood  then  where  the  Maiden  Town  Hall 
now  stands.  Here  he  was  remarkable  not  only  for  the 
steadiness  with  which  he  mastered  the  details  of  his 
business,  but  likewise  for  some  things  which  rarely  oc- 
cupy such  clerks.  He  kept  up  an  extensive  course 
of  reading.  His  books  were  always  ready  to  be  used 
whenever  he  found  spare  hours  or  moments  on  his 
hands.  He  sought  the  acquaintance  of  people  who  were 
reputed  aristocratic  or  learned,  that  he  might  obtain 


Beginnings.  25 

from  them  the  books  whose  perusal  he  coveted.  In 
this  desultory  manner  he  contrived  to  read  a  great 
many  novels  and  books  of  travel,  and  some  historical 
works  of  considerable  scope. 

His  natural  power  of  making  friends  showed  itself 
even  in  this  early  stage  of  his  career.  William  H.  Rich- 
ardson, a  fellow-clerk  in  the  establishment,  remained 
one  of  Haven's  staunchest  friends  until  death  ended 
their  connection.  He  always  found  time  to  visit  Haven 
in  later  years  wherever  he  might  chance  to  be  appointed 
pastor.  Getting  off  once  at  the  railroad  station  in  West- 
field,  Mass.,  Mr.  Richardson  asked  the  driver  who  took 
him  over  to  the  parsonage  whether  he  conducted  many 
passengers  there.  That  worthy  promptly  responded, 
"  O  yes,  lots  of  them  !  but  most  of  'em  are  niggers." 
Another  lad  in  the  same  store  was  Joseph  Ames.  He 
was  destined  to  become  well  known  to  the  public  after- 
ward as  a  portrait  painter.  It  appears  that  young 
Ames  had  begun  to  practice  his  art  in  those  early  days 
on  such  subjects  as  offered.  He  painted  two  portraits 
of  his  companion  in  the  store.  One  of  these  portraits 
is  the  picture  of  a  chubby-cheeked,  rosy-faced,  red- 
haired  boy  by  an  unskilled  beginner  in  the  pictorial  art ; 
the  other  is  the  portrait  of  Gilbert  Haven  in  his  ripe 
maturity,  coming,  when  he  was  doing  his  best  work  as 
editor  of  "  Zion's  Herald,"  from  the  easel  of  an  artist 
who  had  attained  eminence  in  his  profession.  Mr. 
Ames  was  near  the  tragic  end  of  his  own  life  when  the 
second  portrait  was  executed.     Between  himself  and 

Gilbert  Haven  there  had  been  no  intimacy,  but  each 
3 


26 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


had  retained  a  kindly  feeling  for  the  other  from  the 
years  of  childhood  and  youth.  Notwithstanding  this 
portrait  was  not  well  liked  by  many  of  Bishop  Haven's 
friends,  it  is  the  one  which  will  be  the  favorite  hereafter, 
since  in  it  the  subject  saw  his  own  most  successful  pre- 
sentment to  the  eye. 

The  sister  next  older  than  Gilbert,  Bethiah  Gardner 
Haven,  was  a  young  lady  of  an  intellectual  turn  of  mind, 
who  had  given  considerable  attention  to  the  study  of 
French  and  Latin.  One  of  her  instructors  in  these 
tongues  had  been  the  Rev.  Edward  Otheman,  now  resid- 
ing in  Chelsea,  Mass.  This  sister  had  become  an  excel- 
lent scholar  in  these  languages,  and  Gilbert  put  himself 
under  her  tuition.  This  is  the  first  authentic  sign  we 
have  encountered  that  the  young  Maiden  clerk  has  as- 
pirations for  something  better  than  selling  and  buying 
to  get  gain  as  his  earthly  vocation.  No  very  precise 
details  are  given  in  regard  to  his  studies  and  reading  of 
that  date.  The  natural  result  of  it  soon  appeared  in  the 
awakening  of  a  strong  desire  in  the  ambitious  youth  for 
a  better  education  than  could  be  had  in  Maiden.  And 
so  it  at  last  fell  out  that  Gilbert  Haven,  with  such  an 
outfit  as  we  have  described,  was  enrolled  in  the  spring 
of  1839  oi^e  of  the  students  of  Wesleyan  Academy,  at 
Wilbraham,  Mass. 


Boarding  House,  Wilbkaham  Academy. 


Academy  Building,  Wileraham,  Mass. 


School  Life. 


CHAPTER  II. 


SCHOOL  LIFE. 


At  Wilbraham— The  School— His  Studies-  -Companions— Attitude  toward  Religion- 
Good  Traits  and  Bad— Bethiah's  Sickness— A  Revival  in  School-Haven's  Conversion- 
Joy  and  Fidelity— End  of  the  Term- Happy  Thanksgiving. 


ESLEYAN  ACADEMY  is  one  of  the  earliest 


^  ^  and  most  successful  academies  established  under 
the  patronage  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  in  the 
United  States.  Its  name  shows  its  ecclesiastical  rela- 
tions. Wesley's  well-known  Kingswood  School  was  its 
chief  model,  though  that  model  had  not  been  closely 
followed  in  details.  It  was  always  free  from  that  multi- 
tude of  rules  which  were  so  often  found  at  Kingswood 
a  sore  burden  to  teachers  and  pupils  alike.  This  change 
was  the  result  in  part  of  differences  between  the  coun- 
tries in  which  the  schools  exist. 

While  the  English  school  was  open  from  the  begin- 
ning only  for  boys,  the  Wilbraham  one  was  open  to 
both  sexes.  This  feature  was  probably  taken  from  the 
public  schools  around  it,  where  persons  of  either  sex 
studied  and  taught  together.  Since  this  seminary 
served  as  a  model  for  many  others,  it  naturally  claims 
the  proud  distinction  of  a  position  in  the  vanguard  of 
the  great  movement  which  is  now  opening  the  doors  of 
the  most  famous  colleges  of  the  land  to  women. 

The  atmosphere  of  the  school  was  deeply  religious. 


28 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


It  was  intended  to  develop  piety  as  well  as  scholarship, 
and  its  work  would  have  been  deemed  defective  if  either 
aim  had  been  missed.  Still,  moral  suasion  w^as  mainly 
employed  for  the  attainment  of  the  religious  purposes 
of  the  school.  The  regulations  only  demanded  daily 
attendance  on  morning  and  evening  prayers  in  chapel, 
and  on  two  church  services  of  a  Sunday.  Those  who 
desired  could  also  attend  Sunday-school,  and  a  weekly 
class-meeting  and  prayer-meeting.  Besides  these,  Sun- 
day morning  prayer-meetings  and  meetings  in  private 
rooms  for  pious  conversation  were  sometimes  held  by 
zealously  religious  students. 

The  school  was  then  new.  It  had  not  yet  the  advan- 
tages of  spacious  and  well-kept  grounds,  large  and  fine 
buildings,  ample  libraries,  cabinets  and  scientific  appa- 
ratus, which  have  since  been  so  munificently  provided 
through  the  generosity  of  its  patrons.  Its  internal 
organization  was  not  then  so  complete  nor  its  corps  of 
instructors  so  large  and  efficient  as  at  present.  Yet  it 
deservedly  held  a  high  position  among  institutions  of 
its  grade  forty  years  ago.  Such  was  the  school  in  which 
Gilbert  Haven  was  a  pupil  during  the  spring  and  fall 
terms  of  1839. 

We  have  no  very  full  accounts  on  which  to  found  the 
story  of  his  school-life  at  Wilbraham.  Certain  state- 
ments of  his  own,  the  clear  recollections  of  several  of 
his  school-fellows,  and  some  letters  of  that  period  from 
his  own  hand,  are  all  the  data  that  remain  to  us  from 
that  critical  season.  The  books  of  the  academy  do 
not  show  what  studies  he  pursued  during  those  two 


School  Life.  29 

terms.  We  know  from  other  sources  that  he  studied 
French,  and  was  counted  proficient  enough  to  give  an 
address  in  that  tongue  in  certain  public  exercises  of  his 
society,  "  The  Union  Philosophical,"  at  the  close  of  the 
fall  term.  Mrs.  C.  L.  Rice,  of  Springfield,  Massachu- 
setts, remembers  him  as  one  of  the  best  declaimers  in 
the  school,  with  an  easy  and  effective  style  of  address. 
He  was  a  ready  debater,  and  warmed  up  when  school 
topics  were  introduced,  though  he  did  not  take  a  lead- 
ing part  in  his  society. 

The  only  school  composition  of  his  preserved  to  these 
days,  considers  the  fitness  of  certain  limitations  put 
upon  the  association  of  the  sexes  in  the  school.  One  of 
his  letters  says  that  the  principal,  Mr.  Patten,  had  been 
talking  to  the  students  on  that  subject,  but  no  good 
result  had  come  of  it.  Haven  was  in  favor  of  greater 
freedom.  He  always  was,  and  hence  reported  some- 
what hotly  in  one  of  his  letters  home :  "  They  talk  of 
making  some  new  rules,  stricter  than  the  old  '  blue 
laws'  of  Connecticut."  His  natural  liking  for  relief 
from  all  such  restrictions  shows  itself  in  a  letter  wherein 
he  serio-comically  sets  forth  the  advantages  of  having 
to  care  for  a  sick  chum  :  "  I  don't  have  to  get  up  for 
prayers  and  hardly  to  breakfast,  so  I  get  along  first- 
rate.  I  also  fare  first-rate,  having  custards,  pie,  cake, 
lemonade,  rum  punch,  etc." 

It  seems,  however,  that  young  Haven  was  counted 
from  the  outset  among  the  irreligious  men  of  the  school. 
His  first  letter  home  shows  that  he  had  accepted  this 
position  without  much  thought  or  compunction.  He 


30  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

says :  "  I  have  been  listening  for  the  last  half  hour  to  a 
long  sermon  on  religion  by  one  of  the  most  pious  stu- 
dents in  the  school,  and  I  can't  tell  how  much  good  it 
has  done,  perhaps  some."  The  bare  fact  that  he  con- 
sented to  be  treated  in  this  way  shows  the  bent  of  his 
mind  to  carelessness  and  irreligion.  He  had  not  the 
fixed  character  which  makes  school-life  morally  safe. 
Of  quick  social  feelings,  eager  for  popularity,  fond  of 
easy  pleasures,  Gilbert  Haven  found  his  path  beset  with 
snares.  Among  his  companions  were  some  who  com- 
bined good  scholarship  and  showy  personal  qualities 
with  freedom  from  moral  restraints.  With  some  of 
these  he  was  hail-fellow  well  met. 

It  admits  of  no  doubt  that  young  Haven's  course  at 
Wiibraham  was  for  a  time  discreditable.  Dr.  Went- 
worth  is  correct  in  saying  :  *'  He  was  for  a  brief  season 
'  fast,'  making  associates  of  '  fast '  young  men,  making 
companions,  says  Dr.  Rice,  a  schoolmate,  of  the  best  of 
the  bad  boys."  This  declaration  is  not  only  justified  by 
what  Haven  himself  wrote  just  after  his  conversion,  when 
he  might  be  suspected  of  unconscious  exaggeration,  but 
also  by  an  entry  made  in  his  Journal  during  his  pastor- 
ate at  Wiibraham,  in  1853  :  "I  have  got  back  to  an  old 
home,  the  birth-place  of  my  soul,  of  much  of  my  mind, 
Wiibraham.  Have  enjoyed  it  some,  though  not  so 
much  as  I  might,  had  not  the  ghastly  forms  of  boyish 
pleasure  flitted  before  the  memory,  and  a  painful  sense 
of  loss  marred  the  joyful  one  of  gain." 

During  this  evil  period  he  was  making  a  sad  record 
of  irregularities  and  deficiencies  in  school,  which  taxed 


School- Life. 


31 


sorely  the  patient  kindness  of  those  who  hoped  better 
things  for  him.  His  own  judgment,  then  and  afterward, 
was  that  he  had  come  to  the  verge  of  expulsion  from 
school.  He  was  characteristically  frank  in  recognizing 
his  own  wickedness,  and  never  tried  to  deck  out  his 
bad  ways  with  any  beautifying  colors. 

But,  of  course,  he  was  not  wholly  bad,  nor  was  he 
entirely  given  over  to  bad  companionships.  His  letters 
home 'show,  even  at  the  worst  period,  a  very  affectionate 
nature.  His  father  and  mother,  brothers  and  sisters,  are 
all  remembered  quite  tenderly  at  the  very  moment  that 
he  was  keeping  back  from  them  facts  which  would  have 
aroused  their  worst  fears.  He  went  boldly  with  his 
comrades  upon  some  of  his  most  desperate  deeds  of 
impiety,  when  he  must  have  been  smarting  keenly  under 
the  reproaches  of  that  faithful  home-god,"  his  own 
conscience. 

While  he  was  in  this  condition  of  growing  wickedness 
and  danger,  word  was  brought  him  from  home  that  his 
sister  Bethiah  was  on  the  verge  of  death.  The  letter  in 
which  Gilbert  acknowledges  the  receipt  of  these  sorrow- 
ful tidings  is  filled  with  outbursts  of  intense  grief.  He 
sends  words  of  tenderness  and  kisses  of  love  to  the  dying 
girl.  He  confesses  his  evil  ways,  and  promises  to  become 
a  better  boy,  so  that  the  hope  of  a  future  re-union  may 
brighten  her  closing  days.  There  is  reason  to  fear  that 
this  penitence  was  only  that  sorrow  of  the  world,  which 
worketh  death,  since  the  duty  of  beginning  the  new 
life  was  not  entered  upon.  He  who  adjourns  duty  to 
God  insults  his  own  conscience  as  well  as  the  divine 


32 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


authority,  since  the  intent  to  repent  to-morrow  involves 
the  purpose  to  sin  to-day.  In  Gilbert  Haven's  case  it 
did  not  check  him  even  in  the  worst  practices  into  which 
he  had  fallen.  Whatever  penitential  moods  he  may 
have  passed  through  his  companions  saw  nothing  but 
his  wonted  darintj  in  transgression. 

But  God  still  had  thoughts  of  mercy  for  the  youth 
who  seemed  to  be  so  recklessly  throwing  away  his  best 
opportunities,  spiritual  and  intellectual.  A  religious 
revival,  under  the  ministry  of  Rev.  William  Livesey, 
broke  out  in  the  town  and  school.  Haven's  attitude 
toward  the  movement  at  first  was  partly  one  of  dislike 
but  mainly  of  indifference.  He  went  to  the  religious 
services  held  in  the  village  church  only  when  the 
preacher  had  the  credit  of  being  an  eloquent  speaker. 
Some  of  the  ministers  thus  won  their  way  through  his 
ears  to  his  heart.  The  following  letter,  with  which  he 
soon  gladdened  his  troubled  parents,  tells  the  unex- 
pected story  of  his  sudden  conversion  to  Christ.  W'e 
omit  and  abridge  what  requires  it.  The  letter  is  not 
dated,  but  was  written  on  October  21,  1839,  ^^e  third 
day  after  the  memorable  conversion  it  records.  It  is 
addressed  to  his  "  Ever  dear  parents,"  and  after  explain- 
ing the  reason  for  writing  again  so  soon,  continues  : 

I  was  afraid  Bethiah  might  be  taken  suddenly  away,  and  I  never 
have  the  opportunity  of  informing  her  of  the  glorious  news  that 
I  have  some  hopes  of  meeting  her  in  heaven.  ...  I  feel  it  my 
delight  to  tell  her  that  I  too  can  say,  God  is  good.  I  know  you 
will  be  surprised,  aye,  overwhelmed  with  astonishment  and  delight, 
to  hear  that  the  prodigal  has  returned  10  his  Father's  arms.  But 


School  Life. 


33 


I  hope  and  trust  that  such  is  the  case.  I  feel  the  blessed  assurance 
of  sins  forgiven,  that  my  sins,  which  were  as  scarlet,  have  become 
as  white  as  snow  through  the  blood  of  the  Lamb.  .  .  .  Little  did 
I  think,  and  less  did  I  care,  that  I  should  become  a  recipient  ot 
these  joys.  .  .  .  Wednesday  afternoon  I  attended  meeting,  because 
I  wished  to  hear  the  preacher,  second  to  but  one  or  two  that  I  ever 
heard  in  delivery.  .  .  .  He  preached  a  beautiful  sermon,  but  I  had 
no  particular  impressions  at  the  time.  His  text  was,  "  And  they 
all  with  one  consent  began  to  mai<e  excuse."  His  name,  I  forgot 
to  mention,  is  Rosser,  [since  Bishop  Rosser  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church,  South,]  a  name  which  will  long  be  treasured  in 
my  memory.  .  .  .  That  evening,  Mr.  Rice,  of  Springfield,  one  of 
the  two  mentioned  above  as  equal  to  Mr.  Rosser,  preached,  but  I 
slept  under  his  sermon.  Friday  afternoon  and  evening  Mr.  Rosser 
preached.  I  liked  him  very  well  in  the  afternoon.  His  text  was 
"  Preach  the  Word;  "  I  liked  him  because  he  was  so  eloquent,  not 
because  I  felt  that  he  did  "  preach  the  Word."  In  the  evening  he 
preached  from  the  words,  "  Blessed  are  they  that  mourn  :  for  they 
shall  be  comforted,"  a  beautiful  serinon.  I  felt  some  slight  com- 
punctions of  conscience  during  the  evening,  but  nothing  very  par- 
ticular until  'after  meeting,  when  I  went  to  walk  with  Mr.  R.,  the 
wildest  fellow  here,  except  myself,  and  one  who  was  warned  once  to 
go  home.  No  doubt  we  should  both  have  been  sent  home  if  we  had 
not  taken  the  step  we  have.  We  had  a  long  conversation,  and  at 
last  came  to  the  conclusion  to  go  to  the  inquiry-meeting  in  the  morn- 
ing at  any  rate,  if  we  proceeded  no  further.  Well,  we  went ;  and  I 
bless  the  Lord  that  I  was  enabled  to  take  up  my  cross  and  go  for- 
ward. We  were  unexpectedly  joined  by  another  of  our  companions, 
and  we  three  went  forward.  And  that  afternoon  I  believe  the  Lord 
spoke  peace  to  my  soul.  I  felt— 1  cannot  describe  my  feelings; 
they  were  a  mixture  of  joy  and  sorrow,  of  gladness  and  mourning. 
.  .  .  The  next  day,  almost  for  the  first  time,  with  delight  I  hailed 
the  music  of  the  bells.  Mr.  Livesey  preached  in  the  morning,  Mr. 
Patten  in  the  afternoon,  and  Mr.  Miner  Raymond  in  the  evening.  O, 

I  have  spent  one  good  Sabbath  !  .  .  .  Monday  I  did  not  feel  so  well 
2* 


34 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


in  mind  until  evening,  when  I  was  happy,  superlatively  happy. 
We  had  a  glorious  prayer-meeting  previous  to  the  evening  services. 
.  .  .  Then  I  heard  Mr.  Rice.  His  text  was,  "  Behold  the  Lamb  of 
God,  which  taketh  away  the  sin  of  the  world  !  "  the  best  text  and 
the  best  sermon  that  it  was  ever  my  lot  to  hear.  O,  I  never  was  so 
happy,  even  in  anticipation  !  I  never  thought  such  could  be  the  en- 
joyment of  religion.  .  .  .  Tell  Bethiah  I  hope  now  if  I  should  never 
see  her  again  on  earth,  I  may  behold  her  in  heaven.  I  must  write 
to  William  Richardson.  Pray  for  me,  that  I  may  have  strength  to 
take  up  my  cross,  i  have  also  three  other  letters  to  answer  from 
wild  fellows  here.  ...  It  is  one  o'clock  and  I  must  begin  to  think 
of  retiring.  Good-night,  kind  parents ;  good-night,  beloved  brother 
and  sisters  ;  good-night,  dear  friends,  all,  all. 

The  prodigal  son,  Gilbert. 

Except  a  man  be  born  again,  he  cannot  see  the 
kingdom  of  God,"  said  Jesus  of  Nazareth.  Thus, 
through  the  divine  mercy,  did  that  great  change  come 
to  pass  for  Gilbert  Haven,  through  which  men  are 
made  new  creatures  in  Christ  Jesus.  The  same  Mas- 
ter also  said,  If  any  man  will  come  after  me,  let  him 
deny  himself,  and  take  up  his  cross,  and  follow  me." 
We  shall  find  this  boyish  conversion  followed  up  by 
forty  years  of  humble  and  faithful  discipleship.  No 
pretense  was  ever  set  up  by  Gilbert  Haven  that  he  was 
a  model  in  his  conduct  up  to  the  hour  of  his  conversion. 
He  had  not  lived  in  all  good  conscience  "  under  the 
blessings  which  God  had  given  him.  He  was  such  ^a 
sinner  that  he  could  put  no  confidence  in  his  own 
righteousness.  But  he  turned  to  God  with  childlike 
faith  in  the  promises,  and  instantly  found  what  holy 
Herbert  had  found  before  him : 


School  Life. 


35 


"  Hungrie  I  was  and  had  no  meat : 

I  did  conceit  a  most  delicious  feast ; 
I  had  it  straight,  and  did  as  truly  eat, 

As  ever  did  a  welcome  guest. 

There  is  a  rare  outlandish  root, 
Which  when  I  could  not  get,  I  thought  it  here: 
That  apprehension  cured  so  well  my  foot, 
That  I  can  walk  to  heaven  well  neare. 

*•  1  owed  thousands  and  much  more  ; 

I  did  believe  that  I  did  nothing  owe, 
And  lived  accordingly  ;  my  creditor 

Believes  so  too,  and  lets  me  go. 

**  Faith  makes  me  any  thing,  or  all 

That  I  believe  is  in  the  sacred  storie  ; 
And  where  sin  placeth  me  in  Adam's  fall, 

Faith  sets  me  higher  in  his  glorie. 

"  If  I  go  lower  in  the  book. 

What  can  be  lower  than  the  common  manger  ? 
Faith  puts  me  there  with  him  who  sweetly  took 

Our  flesh  and  frailty,  death  and  danger. 

"  If  blisse  had  lien  in  art  or  strength, 

None  but  the  wise  or  strong  had  gained  it ; 

Where  now  by  faith  all  arms  are  of  a  length, 
One  size  doth  all  conditions  fit." 

We  have  no  further  remark  to  make  on  this  wonder- 
ful conversion,  save  to  note  Gilbert  Haven's  instant 
endeavors  to  bring  others  to  a  like  experience.  That 
affectionate  spirit  which  would  not  let  him  seek  his  own 
salvation  alone,  flashes  out  afresh  in  his  eagerness  to 
write  at  once  to  his  friend  Richardson  about  religion, 
and  to  answer  the     wild  fellows,"  whom  he  cannot 


36  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

readily  give  up  to  evil.  Such  he  was  life  long  ;  his  lov- 
ing nature  clung  fast  to  multitudes  whom  he  would  fain 
compel  to  turn  with  him  to  Christ.  He  was  all  the 
more  zealous  because  the  close  of  the  term  was  just  at 
hand,  and  men  live  fast  in  revivals.  We  only  know  that 
he  was  very  assiduous  in  his  religious  duties,  while  his 
school-work  was  done  with  a  patience  and  care  such  as 
he  had  never  before  shown. 

The  term  closed  so  that  he  could  return  home  in 
time  for  Thanksgiving,  the  great  annual  feast  of  our 
Puritan  New  England.  We  can  readily  imagine  the 
higher  zest  wherewith  the  Haven  household  kept  those 
memorable  hours  of  festivity.  Beyond  all  the  temporal 
mercies  which  crowned  the  year,  above  the  ordinary 
domestic  felicity  of  their  circle,  was  the  crowning  gift  of 
the  divine  compassion,  the  recovery  of  a  beloved  son 
and  brother  from  the  gravest  spiritual  peril,  and  his  sur- 
render to  God's  will.  Bethiah  still  lingered  to  welcome 
her  favorite  brother,  talk  over  with  him  the  new  life  he 
had  begun,  exchange  pledges  of  future  meetings  above, 
and  show  him  how  a  Christian  ought  to  suffer  and  die. 
About  a  month  later  God  blessed  her  with  a  happy  end. 


Business  and  Study. 


37 


CHAPTER  III. 


BUSINESS  AND  STUDY. 


At  Home— Business  in  Boston— Begins  a  Journal— Its  Value— Petty  Vexations— Be- 
comes a  Clerk  at  Tenney's— His  City  Home— Trials  and  Success  as  Clerk— Estimate  of 
him  by  Employer  and  Associates— Religious  Life— Religious  Home— Preachers  Heard— 
Social  Meetings— Piety— Temptations— Study  of  Greek  and  Geometry— Rev.  William 
Rice— Reading— Returns  to  Wilbraham- Preparation  for  College. 


E  have  no  record  of  Gilbert  Haven's  doings  for 


nine  months  after  his  return  from  Wilbraham. 
With  that  event  the  call  for  correspondence  with  his 
family  ceased.  He  mentions  a  few  other  correspond- 
ents ;  but,  alas  !  either  hungry  oblivion  has  swallowed 
them  up,  so  that  their  memorial  has  perished  with  them, 
or  they  have  not  preserved  the  letters  which  would 
shed  a  twinkle  of  welcome  light  upon  those  months 
now  grown  as  dull  and  opaque  for  us  as  they  were  once 
bright  and  happy  for  him. 

That  he  kept  up  his  old  habit  of  much  and  various 
reading,  with  a  religious  and  theological  element  added, 
was  a  matter  of  course.  That  he  was  true  to  his  new 
habit  of  much  prayer,  pious  meditations  on  the  Bible 
and  his  personal  experiences,  and  that  his  devotion  was 
fed  by  the  worship  of  the  sanctuary  and  social  meetings, 
admits  no  question.  He  remained  at  home  during  the 
winter,  witnessed  the  happy  end  of  Bethiah's  pilgrim- 
age, and  helped  his  father  about  his  work.  Efforts  were 
made  to  procure  him  a  start  in  business  in  Boston. 


38  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

Accordingly  we  find  that  he  became  a  clerk  in  the 
store  of  L.  W.  &  C.  H.  Nichols,  at  No.  14  Tremont-st., 
Boston,  the  fourth  of  March,  1840.  We  have  no  ac- 
counts of  his  life  there  until  six  months  had  passed  ; 
then,  on  September  i,  Gilbert  Haven  began  a  Journal, 
giving  an  almost  daily  notice  of  his  affairs  until  Sep- 
tember 18,  1 841.  The  Journal  then  ends  so  abruptly 
that  one  suspects  the  rest  must  have  been  lost.  Of  this 
Journal  the  author  wrote  afterward  : 

I  had  just  lost  Bethiah,  and  my  mind  was  deeply  affected.  I  had 
a  few  months  before  begun  the  Christian  life,  and  its  novelty,  so- 
lemnity, and  grandeur  engaged  my  whole  heart.  I  was  placed 
under  a  disagreeable  master  in  a  disagreeable  store,  which  tended 
to  drive  me  still  further  inward  in  my  search  after  peace  and  pleas- 
ure. I  had  an  intense  thirst  for  knowledge,  which  increased  my 
distaste  for  society  and  business.  These  circumstances  tended  to 
characterize  my  writings  with  sadness,  solitariness  and  religious 
sensibility. 

We  have  been  informed  that  this  record  afterward 
seemed  to  its  writer  somewhat  unreal  and  extravagant. 
But  whatever  its  faults,  it  enables  us  to  obtain  an  in- 
sight into  these  formative  years  which  is  invaluable. 
For  one  thing,  it  sheds  much  light  on  his  business  life 
in  his  new  grapple  with  the  world. 

When  he  had  been  six  months  in  the  store  he  makes 
this  entry : 

Charles  [the  junior  partner]  was  rather  out  of  sorts,  and  vented 
his  feelings  on  us  clerks,  finding  fault  continually,  while  I  was  laugh- 
ing. I  do  not  feel  much  condemnation,  because  I  did  not  do  it  for 
revenge  or  scorn,  but  because  of  the  grotesqueness  of  his  conduct, 


Business  and  Study.  39 
Here  is  another  touch  : 

This  morning,  preparing  to  obey  a  command  of  Mr.  Nichols,  I 
was  suddenly  stopped  by  Charles,  and  the  article  I  was  to  carry  de- 
manded. I  refused,  and  though  afterward  I  was  severely  tried 
about  my  conduct,  at  last  I  felt  no  condemnation,  and  Mr.  Nichols 
afterward  approved  it. 

Charles  was  evidently  a  sore  cross  to  young  Haven. 
He  taxed  the  two  clerks  with  want  of  interest  in  the 
business,  and  subjected  them  to  a  jealous  surveillance. 
On  one  occasion  he  hid  away  the  books  which  Haven 
had  on  hand  for  use  in  moments  of  leisure. 

The  business  itself  was  petty.  To  sell  fifteen  or 
twenty  dollars'  worth  a  day  for  each  salesman  was 
prosperity.  Gilbert  frequently  records  that  business  is 
**  dull,"  or  so-so."  Once  he  says :  There  is  little 
doing  in  the  mercantile  line  except  in  the  Elssler 
cuffs."  These  cuffs  were  named  in  honor  of  the  fa- 
mous danseusey  who  was  just  then  charming  Puritan 
Boston  by  her  bewildering  pirouettes,  and  by  subscribing 
$1,000  to  the  Bunker  Hill  Monument.  It  seems  now 
incredible  to  recall  the  sensation  produced  by  the  too 
volatile  Fanny  in  staid  New  England.  Some  wag  hit 
off  the  popular  madness  by  putting  Emerson  and  Mar- 
garet Fuller  among  her  spectators  on  one  occasion. 
They  came,  saw,  and  were  conquered.  O  Ralph,  this 
is  poetry!"  No,  Margaret,  it  is  religion!"  they  ex- 
claimed in  turn. 

The  speedy  consequence  of  the  bad  state  of  affairs  in 
the  store  was  that  young  Haven  began  to  look  about 
for  some  more  eligible  position  when  his  year  should 


40  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

expire.  He  denies  the  justice  of  the  charges  brought 
against  him.  His  connection  with  the  Nichols  firm  was 
not  severed  without  some  bad  feeUng  on  their  part.  Char- 
acteristic of  the  clerk  was  it  that  he  took  pains  to  visit 
them  afterward,  and  rested  not  until  good  feeling  was 
quite  restored.  There  is  not  a  sign  of  bad  temper  in  any 
record  in  the  Journal  on  that  subject.  Three  months 
later  he  enters  without  comment  the  following  virtual 
vindication  : 

Received  a  note  from  Charles  Nichols,  requesting  an  interview.  I 
went  to-day.  He  proposed  to  have  me  come  back  to  the  store,  of- 
fering me,  indirectly  and  inferentially,  a  partnership.  I  declined,  be- 
lieving I  should  be  much  better  situated  as  I  am. 

On  March  4,  1841,  he  became  clerk  in  the  carpet  store 
of  Tenney  &  Co.  This  was  then  the  largest  concern  of 
its  kind  in  Boston.  Haven  was  to  have  8275  the  first 
year.  Tenney  &  Co.  did  business  on  the  corner  of  Sa- 
lem and  Prince  Streets.  Haven  found  a  pleasant  home 
with  a  Mrs.  Goddard,  who  lived  at  No.  3  Stillman 
Street,  a  street  leading  from  Charlestown  Street  to  Sa- 
lem Street.  These  places  are  all  in  what  is  known  as 
the  North  End,  but  were  then  in  the  very  heart  of  the 
best  business  quarter  of  the  city.  Here  Haven  found 
himself  among  a  set  of  alert  and  ambitious  young  men 
in  one  of  the  best-appointed  stores  of  the  city.  His 
time  was  pretty  closely  occupied  with  his  business. 
When  trade  was  brisk  so  many  goods  would  be  tum- 
bled in  course  of  the  day  that  the  clerks  would  some- 
times be  kept  busy  until  ten  o'clock  at  night  in  getting 
them  into  proper  order.    But  the  place  pleased  him. 


Business  and  Study.  41 

He  liked  its  air  of  life  and  success,  its  polite  and  affable 
clerks,  and  its  opportunities  for  advancement.  The 
Journal  shows  that  he  was  successful  as  a  salesman. 
Here  are  some  entries  of  his  daily  sales:  "March  12, 
$175  ;  April  26,  $42  ;  September  17,  $1,500-"  The  rec- 
ord  broke  off  before  the  year  was  half  out. 

We  find  no  trace  of  any  of  the  persons  who  were  Ha- 
ven's associates  at  Nichols  &  Son's,  but  two  of  his  com- 
panions at  Tenney  &  Co.'s  are  well-known  citizens  of 
Boston.  One  of  them,  John  M.  Clark,  has  held  for 
many  years  the  office  of  Sheriff  of  Suffolk  County,  the 
other  is  the  merchant-prince,  Eben  Jordan,  senior  part- 
ner in  the  great  firm  of  Jordan  &  Marsh.  These  men 
report  that  young  Haven  was  one  of  the  most  esteemed 
and  successful  clerks  in  the  establishment.  He  was 
spoken  of  among  them  as  one  who  knew  every  thing 
that  was  going  on  in  the  newspapers,  and  was  posted  on 
all  political  questions  and  reformatory  movements.  He 
was  a  cheerful  comrade,  and  furnished  a  flood  of  stories 
and  anecdotes  for  the  entertainment  of  the  company  on 
those  stormy  days  when  trade  was  at  an  end,  and  all 
odd  jobs  had  been  exhausted.  He  was  generous  of 
money  and  time ;  but  nobody  thought  him  likely  to  live 
a  business  life,  so  great  was  his  interest  in  books  and 
study. 

Mr.  Tenney,  the  head  of  the  firm,  is  yet  living  in  old 
age  and  want.  Rev.  John  W.  Hamilton,  who  visited 
him  in  order  to  learn  what  he  remembered  about 
Haven,  informs  us  that  he  still  has  a  clear  memory  of 
his  former  clerk.     He  not  only  recalls  the  fact  that 


42  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

Haven  was  a  favorite  in  the  store,  but  also  that  he  had 
a  cheery  way,  which  drew  people  to  him,  and  made 
those  who  had  once  traded  with  him  insist  on  being 
waited  on  by  him  again.  He  said  Haven  was  very  suc- 
cessful, so  that  he  made  him  a  very  good  offer  to  retain 
his  services  ;  but  that  the  clerk's  heart  was  set  on  books 
and  religion,  so  that  he  went  off  to  school.  Mr.  Tenney 
states  that  Haven  made  a  better  start  than  Eben  Jor- 
dan did.  Haven's  intimates  know  that  he  was  wont 
sometimes  to  say  that  he  would  have  given  Jordan  a 
stiff  race  before  letting  him  get  the  lead  if  he  had  only 
kept  on  in  business. 

But  how  did  his  religious  life  progress  amid  so  much 
business  ? 

It  is  a  matter  of  course  that  there  was  a  plenty  of 
church-going,  strict  Sabbath-keeping,  and  frequent  at- 
tendance on  social  meetings.  He  usually  attended  on 
the  Methodist  ministry  in  the  city.  Bennet  Street  was 
his  ecclesiastical  home,  though  he  frequently  visited 
North  Russell  Street  and  Bromfield  Street.  He  records 
the  sermons  he  heard,  and  gives  his  impressions  of  the 
preachers.  Sometimes  he  hits  the  mark  neatly :  "  Heard 
Bradford  K.  Peirce  preach  at  Bennet  Street,  an  eloquent 
and  excellent  production  ;  text  Rom.  i,  i6."  That  was 
September  13,  1840.  In  the  afternoon  things  went 
worse  :  "  Heard  Brother  Porter  on  Luke  xvi,  2,  *  Give 
an  account  of  thy  stewardship.'  Lost  the  first  part 
through  drowsiness.  O  that  I  might  overcome  this  sin  ! 
The  latter  part  was  very  good."    Once  he  listened  to 

Brother  Hascall  "  on  the  text,  "  The  Lord  is  not  slack 


Business  and  Study.  43 

concerning  his  promise."  He  reports  this  very  good, 
indeed,  so  that  he  had  no  sleepiness  to  mourn  over  ;  a 
notable  hint  for  preachers.  His  landlady  was  a  Baptist, 
and  sometimes  he  went  with  her  to  hear  Mr.  Neale 
and  Mr.  Hague,  who  made  no  great  impression  on  him. 
But  Dr.  Kirk  did  move  him.  It  is  a  grief  to  add  that 
MafHt  carried  him  by  storm,  as  he  did  thousands  of 
other  unripe  men  like  young  Haven.  The  accounts  he 
gives  of  his  sermons  show  that  Maffit  would  very  soon 
have  left  him  dissatisfied. 

There  was  a  great  deal  of  going  to  social  meetings  in 
this  period.  Once  he  went  to  a  sunrise  prayer-meeting. 
He  dropped  in  on  Father  Taylor's  preaching  and  prayer 
meetings,  and  liked  both.  He  tried  other  social  meet- 
ings, but  preferred  Bennet  Street,  because  they  were  "  so 
full  of  the  Holy  Ghost."  Religious  reading  is  not  want-  ^ 
ing.  The  "  Life  of  Mrs.  Fletcher,"  "  Thomas  a  Kempis,"  ' 
and  Mahan  on  Christian  Perfection,"  were  read  for  edi- 
fication. Surely  here  was  food  enough  for  some  spirit- 
ual life — between  preaching,  meetings,  and  books. 

He  says  of  himself,  September  i,  1840:  "Though  not 
so  entirely  free  as  I  could  wish  from  sinful  desires,  I  can 
say,  '  I  know  that  my  Redeemer  liveth.'  ...  O  for  the 
abiding  witness  of  the  Spirit.  Grant  it,  my  blessed  Sav- 
iour !  "  Again  he  says  :  I  cannot  positively  say  that  I 
have  the  witness  of  the  Spirit,  but  I  think  my  sins  are 
forgiven."  The  fault-finding  of  his  first  employers 
marred  his  religious  peace.  Perhaps  he  did  notice  that 
such  complaints  from  them  usually  brought  the  confes- 
sion from  him,    Not  much  religion  to-day."    The  main 


44  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

faults  in  conduct  acknowledged  in  the  Journal  are  fre- 
quent levity,  pride,  careless  speech,  impatience,  and 
anger.  He  is  sensible  of  lacking  openness,  directness, 
and  courage  in  his  work  of  faith.  We  give  samples  of 
his  entries  on  such  points:  "  October  27,  1840,  wicked- 
ness of  heart  has  been  my  sin  to-day  I  have  felt  at 
times  very  angry  concerning  a  foolish  thing  about  the 
store  ;  though  I  did  not  express  the  anger,  I  felt  it.  O 
that  I  could  fully  obey  the  apostle's  precept :  '  Let  all 
bitterness,  and  wrath,  and  anger,  and  clamor,  and  evil 
speaking,  be  put  away  from  you,  with  all  malice  :  and  be 
ye  kind  one  to  another,  tender-hearted,  fororivin$i  one 
another,  even  as  God  for  Christ's  sake  hath  forgiven 
you.'  "  Later  he  writes  :  "  I  have  enjoyed  some  peace 
and  happiness  to-day,  though  not  all  I  could  wish.  I 
enjoy  class-meeting  better  than  aught  else." 

It  would  appear  that  he  had  much  to  tempt  him  to 
lightness  of  thought  and  speech  in  his  surroundings. 
It  is  probable,  also,  that  his  conscience  was  sometimes 
morbidly  exacting.  In  many  cases  this  must  remain 
mere  conjecture,  because  he  does  not  give  the  details 
required  for  a  certain  decision.  When  he  does  give 
them  they  are  sometimes  rather  trivial.  Political  dis- 
cussion he  seems,  rather  oddly  for  him,  to  avoid  as 
disturbing  too  much  his  religious  peace.  Once  he  wore 
a  decoration  which  somebody  objected  to  as  sinful,  and 
he  felt  condemnation  for  it,  not  on  its  own  account,  but 
because  of  the  way  in  which  he  had  encountered  his 
adviser.  Sometimes  he  could  not  avoid  hearing  "  the 
filthy  conversation  of  the  wicked  "  around  him.  This 


Business  and  Study.  45 

usually  vexed  his  righteous  soul,  but  sometimes  he 
found  something  within  that  responded  to  it,  to  his 
intense  sorrow  and  shame.  One  evening  as  Haven  and 
Pike,  the  other  clerk,  were  about  shutting  up  shop, 
temptation  stepped  into  the  store  in  this  shape:  A 
young  lady  came  in  and  asked  for  silks,^  buying  one 
almost  immediately.  She  was  very  pretty,  and  her 
manner  embarrassed  and  mysterious.  I  was  much 
attracted  by  her  appearance,  and  though  Pike  pro- 
nounced her  a  bad  character,  I  doubt  it  ;  I  should 
like  to  see  her  again." 

The  Journal  tells  no  more,  but  this  beautiful  ''strange 
woman  "  had  her  eyes  on  him  so  often,  threw  herself 
so  frequently  across  his  path,  and  sought  the  store  at 
such  unusual  hours,  that  Haven  was  quickly  convinced 
of  the  correctness  of  Pike's  notion  of  her.  She  lost  her 
attraction  for  the  young  clerk  as  soon  as  he  saw  that 
she  had  lost  her  virtue,  but  she  so  beset  him  that  he 
began  to  fear  lest  some  scandal  might  arise,  and  it  was 
not  without  some  difficulty  that  he  could  keep  clear  of 
her.  There  is  not  a  word  in  this  very  unreserved  diary 
which  does  not  show  Haven  at  this  time  to  have  lived 
a  blameless  life.  Those  who  knew  him  best  can  testify 
to  the  stern  subjection  in  which  he  held  any  passion  or 
impulse  whose  relaxation  would  be  sin. 

The  records  of  these  months  also  reveal  in  Gilbert 
Haven  a  strong  yearning  for  scholarship.  While  in 
the  Nichols  store  he  began  the  study  of  Greek,  under 
the  tuition  of  his  fellow-clerk,  Elvin  Pike,  though  we  do 
not  learn  of  Pike's  part  in  the  matter  from  the  Journal ; 


46  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

but  in  a  later  letter.  September  t,  1840,  we  find  this 
entry :  "  I  have  proceeded  as  far  as  parts  of  speech 
to-day,  in  Greek,  and  like  it  much."    September  30: 

Have  proceeded  as  far  as  numerals  in  my  study,  hav- 
ing  in  a  month  gone  nearly  as  far  as  verbs.  I  like  it 
very  much,  and  hope  I  shall  have  the  privilege  of  pro- 
ceeding much  further  with  my  present  teacher."  A  re- 
view of  all  he  had  done  up  to  October  5  was  finished 
on  the  13th,  when  he  began  the  study  of  verbs  and 
purchased  a  Delectus."  This  shows  a  pretty  strenuous 
devotion  of  spare  hours  to  study.  On  November  6 
his  "Greek  grammar  and  Delectus  disappeared  mys- 
teriously from  the  store,"  and  study  was  interrupted. 
Ten  days  later  he  notes  down  this :  "Ascertained  where 
my  Greek  books  are,  and  also  that  Charles  hid  them. 
Shall  renew  my  studies  to-morrow."  It  is  remarkable 
that  these  records  are  perfectly  free  from  any  invectives 
against  those  who  troubled  him.  Similar  entries  con- 
cerning study  appear  until  the  student-clerk  has  got 
far  on  with  his  grammar  and  begun  to  read  short  lessons 
in  the  Delectus,  showing  an  unmistakable  purpose  to 
master  the  famous  Greek  language. 

While  at  Tenney's  the  eager  student  purchased  a 
geometry,  and  studied  it  to  such  purpose  that  he  was 
one  of  the  best  men  in  his  college  class  in  that  branch 
of  study.  These  facts  show  a  very  resolute  purpose  at 
work  in  the  merry,  story-telling,  much-reading  seller  of 
carpets. 

With  all  his  other  employments  Gilbert  Haven  finds 
time  to  do  considerable  reading  of  a  somewhat  remark- 


Business  and  Study.  47 

able  quality.  He  worked  onward  gradually  through  the 
eight  volumes  of  Mitford's  History  of  Greece."  He 
plodded  his  way  through  Young's  Night  Thoughts," 
not  without  troublesome  suspicions  about  their  poetical 
value.  He  read  the  orations  of  classic  Edward  Everett, 
explored  Lord  Bacon's  Essays,  and  toiled  hard  over 
Dick's  works,  which  last  he  found  a  sadly  operose  task. 
He  borrowed  the  "  Discourses  of  Chalmers"  from  Rev. 
George  Landon,  and  went  through  them  with  profitable 
pleasure.  This  solid  reading  was  offset  with  listening 
to  much  political  speaking  and  sitting  out  a  great  many 
lectures,  some  tedious  and  some  instructive,  as  their 
way  is  the  world  over.  But  the  most  noticeable  fact  in 
his  reading  in  those  days  is  that  he  carefully  went 
through  Butler's  "  Analogy."  He  records  his  progress 
to  the  end  of  the  first  part,  when  he  remarks  :  I  fin- 
ished the  first  part  of  Butler's  '  Analogy  '  yesterday.  It 
is  somewhat  abstruse,  but  very  instructive.  He  proves 
that  God's  government  is  moral,  that  we  are  in  a  state 
of  probation,  and  that  we  shall  receive  our  just  deserts 
in  another  world.  He  is  considered  a  genius  of  the 
first  order,  such  as  scarcely  any  in  the  present  age  can 
equal." 

It  seems  that  much  of  this  reading  was  done  during 
his  walks  in  town  and  country,  and  also  that  consider- 
able time  was  devoted  to  improvement  in  composition. 
His  mind  was  evidently  turning  toward  the  ministry 
as  his  future  pro.'"es3ion.  Rev.  William  Rice  was  then 
stationed  at  North  Maiden,  (now  Melrose,)  and  was  sure 
to  exercise  a  large  and  wise  influence  over  him.  When 


48  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

Gilbert  goes  home  to  Maiden  he  is  apt  to  go  up 
to  North  Maiden  to  see  William  Rice  ;  when  an  ex- 
change brings  Mr.  Rice  within  pedestrian  range  of  Still- 
man  Street,  he  persuades  a  companion  or  two  to  go  with 
him  to  hear  the  preaching  of  a  youth  of  such  great 
promise  that  his  friendly  hearer  hopes  he  will  surely  be 
a  burning  and  shining  light."  When  William  calls 
on  Gilbert  in  the  store,  the  latter's  record  is :  "  Had  a 
visit  from  Brother  Rice.  He  was  very  pleasant  and 
communicative."  I  suspect  this  communicative  friend 
had  much  to  do  with  sending  Gilbert  away  to  prepare 
for  the  ministry,  and  the  lost  Journal  (for  there  was 
one)  would  doubtless  have  revealed  the  facts. 

Gilbert  Haven  shows  the  motives  which  moved  him 
at  this  time  in  words  penned  seven  years  later:  Driven 
by  dislike  for  my  employment,  intense  hankering  after 
knowledge,  ambition  to  make  a  noise  in  the  world,  and 
perhaps  a  humble  desire  to  be  a  preacher,  though  I 
almost  doubt  the  humility  of  the  desire,  1  escaped  from 
Boston  and  business  and  buried  myself  in  books.  Then 
my  Journal  assumed  a  new  shade." 

The  first  result  of  this  change  in  his  plans  for  life  was 
that  Haven  went  to  Wilbraham  in  March,  1842,  to  com- 
plete his  preparation  for  college.  He  was  quite  alive 
now  to  the  importance  of  making  the  most  of  his 
opportunities.  He  reports  to  his  home  friends  that 
Rev.  Charles  Adams,  the  successor  of  Rev.  David 
Patten  as  principal  of  the  school,  was  very  strict  in  en- 
forcing obedience  to  all  the  rules  of  the  institution, 
and  hence  was  more  feared  and  less  loved  than  his 


Business  and  Study. 


49 


predecessor.  He  gives  the  following  statement  of  his 
daily  routine  : 

I  make  progress  in  study,  having  attempted  lately  to  take  Cicero 
with  my  other  studies.  My  time  is  so  divided  that  I  can  employ  it 
to  better  advantage.  I  generally  rise  about  five,  and  take  my  morn- 
ing exercise  before  prayers,  which  come  at  six  o'clock.  Then 
I  engage  in  the  study  of  Cicero  till  nine  o'clock ;  until  ten  I 
read  something  not  connected  with  my  studies,  as  poetry.  From 
ten  to  eleven  I  either  continue  my  reading  or  review  the  lessons 
preparatory  to  reciting  at  eleven  or  one.  From  two  to  three  I 
reread  that  part  of  Virgil  which  is  to  be  recited  at  three,  write  my 
diary  and  read  the  papers.  From  four  to  five  the  Greek  lesson  that 
is  to  be  taken  the  next  day.  From  tea  time  until  about  seven  take 
exercise  ;  the  evening  time  is  given  to  translating  Virgil,  sixty-five  or 
seventy  lines  being  the  daily  task.  I  generally  retire  about  ten 
or  ten  and  a  half  o'clock.  .  .  .  Criticise  freely.  If  you  think  I  waste 
any  of  the  hours,  please  say  so,  and  also  state  how  matters  might  be 
mended. 

One  can  see  at  a  glance  that  small  margin  was  left 
here  for  idleness.  The  man  who  could  give  two  hours  to 
the  daily  study  of  Cicero,  while  carrying  a  full  quota  of 
regular  work  and  giving  some  hours  to  reading  books 
and  papers,  must  have  been  a  much-occupied  student. 
He  conducted  his  preparatory  work  at  Wilbraham  with 
such  vigor  that  he  was  able  to  enter  Wesleyan  Univer- 
sity in  the  judgment  of  his  classmates  well  prepared  for 
his  college  course. 
.3 


50 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  IV. 
college. 

Enters  Wesleyan  University— First  Impressions— Extra  Studies— Beautiful  Middle- 
town— Dr.  Whedon— Dr.  Olin's  Influence— Dr.  Smith— Ardor  in  Work— Standing  in 
Class— The  Junior  Exhibition— The  Eclectic  Society— Reading— College  Friends— Class 
Pride- Gentleness  in  Judgment— Opinion  of  Himself— Teaching  in  Saugus— The  Rice 
Household— F.  H.  Newhall— Social  Life— A  Revival— Emerson  at  Middletown— Emer- 
son's Influence— Lectures  Heard— Prospects— Graduation. 

ILBERT  HAVEN  entered  the  Freshman  class  of 
Wesleyan  University  at  the  opening  of  the  fall  term 
in  1842.  As  the  requirements  for  admission  were  quite 
up  to  the  average  standard  of  the  New  England  colleges 
of  that  period,  the  impression  has  somehow  gone  abroad 
that  his  preparation  was  rushed."  This  notion  cannot 
be  harmonized  with  the  fact,  to  which  his  classmates 
bear  witness,  that  he  ranked  from  the  outset  among  the 
leaders  of  the  class.  The  facts  which  we  have  already 
stated  concerning  his  studies  in  the  French,  Latin,  and 
Greek  languages  show  that  he  had  given  time  enough 
to  this  work  to  do  it  with  thoroughness.  These 
indications  are  drawn  from  fragmentary  records  of  his 
attention  to  such  subjects;  had  we  his  complete  Jour- 
nal, no  doubt  there  would  be  found  full  proof  of  ex- 
cellent preparation  for  college.  Only  one  reference  to 
the  study  of  mathematics  is  found  in  the  data  in  our 
hands,  and  that  merely  records  the  purchase  of  a  geom- 
etry.   Yet  was  he  expert  in  sucli  sciences,  so  that  some 


College.  51 

of  his  college  friends  deemed  that  his  strong  point,  and 
Professor  Smith  (afterward  President  of  the  University) 
who  then  taught  the  mathematics,  recommended  him 
for  the  mathematical  chair  in  a  Southern  college. 

The  correctness  of  these  statements  is  confirmed  by 
one  of  his  first  letters  from  the  University  to  friends  at 
home :  I  have  three  daily  recitations,  of  which  geom- 
etry is  but  a  review,  so  that  I  have  much  leisure  time, 
which  I  devote  to  other  studies,  having  three  longer 
than  the  regular  ones.  I  read  one  hundred  lines  daily 
in  Virgil,  while  we  only  get  sixty  in  Ovid  in  the  recita- 
tion ;  a  chapter  in  the  Greek  Testament  often  longer 
than  the  one  in  mythology  which  I  recite  to  Professor 
Whedon,  five  pages  of  French,  and  about  seventy  pages 
of  Plutarch's  Lives."  Of  course,  the  Freshman  who 
finds  one  of  his  studies  a  review,  and  who  sets  up  a 
course  of  private  study  in  his  early  residence  within 
college  walls,  could  not  have  brought  a  defective 
preliminary  training  there,  however  rapidly  his  prep- 
aration may  have  been  gained.  It  would,  perhaps, 
be  reasonable  to  conjecture  that  one  who  had  done 
so  much  of  his  preparatory  study  by  himself  would 
be  weak  in  those  portions  of  scholarship  whose  dry- 
ness makes  their  attainment  an  unwelcome  drudgery. 
One  might  have  conjectured  that  he  would  be  more 
brilliant  in  translation  than  exact  in  grammatical  skill. 
Mrs.  C.  L.  Rice  affirms  this  to  have  been  the  case 
at  Wilbraham,  his  address  in  French  given  there,  in 
1839,  points  the  same  way,  and  Bishop  E.  O.  Haven 
affirms  that  his  cousin  created  an  enthusiasm  in  his 


52  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

classical  students  at  Amenia,  but  was  not  strong  in 
the  refinements  of  scholarship.  Perhaps  the  most  con- 
clusive, because  involuntary,  testimony  here  is  that  of 
a  classmate  who,  being  so  ill  that  he  expected  to  die, 
requested  that  Haven  might  be  asked  to  prepare  his 
epitaph,  and  then  added  :  "  But  let  it  be  done  in  En- 
glish, Haven  never  did  know  his  Latin  grammar." 

In  our  hands  are  thirty-four  letters  from  his  own 
pen  during  his  residence  in  college,  besides  a  very 
full  Journal  covering  the  lost  fourteen  months  of  his 
course.  From  these  we  shall  produce  such  extracts 
as  will  afford  a  clear  notion  of  his  growth  in  schol- 
arship and  character,  or  shed  some  light  upon  his  pecu- 
liarities. 

The  beautiful  place  itself  enchanted  him  at  the  out- 
set, and  it  retained  its  enchantments  for  him  to  the 
close  of  his  life.  In  one  of  his  first  letters  to  friends  at 
home  he  says :  This  is  one  of  the  most  beautiful 
places  you  can  conceive.  I  wish  you  could  sail  down 
this  elegant  river  and  wander  along  these  shady  streets 
adorned  with  superb  dwellings."  Such  references  to 
the  beauty  of  the  natural  scenery  of  Middletown  and 
vicinity  are  scattered  through  his  letters  and  Journal. 
Now  it  is  the  enchanting  river  which  is  mirrored  in  his 
swift,  light  sentences,  when  he  has  been  with  his  class- 
mates on  an  excursion  by  water  to  Haddam  or  Hart- 
ford ;  now  it  is  the  splendid  view  from  the  White  Rocks 
which  makes  him  despise  the  minerals  which  he  has  gone 
there  to  seek  w4th  his  class,  under  the  lead  of  Professor 
Johnston;  and  now  it  is  some  evanescent  phase  of  earth 


College. 


53 


or  sky  which  he  reproduces.  The  account  of  the  even- 
ing before  the  Fourth  of  July,  in  1845,  ^^  ill  serve  as  an 
example : 

Preceded  by  four  or  five  days  of  continued  rain,  the  day  was  the 
most  beautiful  imaginable.  It  opened  gloriously,  preceded  by  the 
most  gorgeous  sunset  I  have  ever  seen— black  velvet,  fringed  with 
gold— the  w^estern  heavens  variegated  with  sublimity  ;  the  eastern 
spanned  with  rainbows,  light  and  dark  ;  the  southern  floating  in 
bluest  azure ;  the  earth  with  her  robe  of  green  and  brown  ;  the  dark 
serpentine  river ;  the  enameled  houses,  dripping  with  tears  and  sun- 
shine ;  the  whole  scene  was  a  worthy  prelude  to  our  nation's  birth- 
day. 

Some  of  his  friends  of  later  date  used  to  conjecture 
that  his  taste  for  beautiful  natural  scenery  grew  out  of 
his  study  of  Wordsworth  ;  but  these  passages  show  that 
the  poet  must  have  charmed  him  as  he  did  largely  be- 
cause he  fed  an  instinctive  appreciation  for  natural 
beauty  of  every  variety. 

In  one  of  his  first  letters  from  college  he  gives  his 
earliest  impressions  of  the  institution  that  was  now  his 
home  : 

I  enjoy  myself  among  my  new  friends.  Our  lives  pass  pleasantly 
in  the  acquisition  of  knowledge.  Professors  very  gentlemanly  and 
great  in  their  departments,  excelling  as  a  body  any  other  college  in 
New  England,  except  Yale  and  Harvard.  President  Olin  arrived 
here  about  a  fortnight  ago.  He  is  a  fine-looking  man,  much  about 
the  size  and  appearance  of  your  honored  father.  He  appears  very 
sickly,  having  officiated  at  prayers  but  thrice  since  his  arrival.  His 
advent  was  hailed  with  great  joy  by  the  students,  and  the  star- 
spangled  banner  waved  proudly  from  the  tower  of  the  chapel.  We 
expect  great  additions  in  consequence  of  this  change  in  our  officers. 


54  Ltfe  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

If  this  should  appear  to  any  the  judgment  of  an  en- 
thusiastic Freshman,  it  should  be  borne  in  mind  that 
Bishop  Haven  retained  the  same  opinion  of  his  college 
instructors  as  long  as  he  lived.    The  names  of  Olin, 
Smith,  Johnston,  and  Whedon  on  the  faculty  roll  of  that 
period  go  far  to  justify  this  honorable  opinion.    It  is 
remarkable  that  the  two  men  who  made  the  deepest 
impression  upon  him  were  the  two  with  whom  he  had 
the  least  to  do.    Professor  Whedon  left  the  college  at 
the  close  of  Mr.  Haven's  first  year,  though  meanwhile 
he  had  given  daily  instruction  to  the  Freshmen.    Yet  so 
profound  had  been  the  sense  of  his  great  ability  in  the 
young  student's  mind,  that  he  always  counted  him 
among  the  ablest  thinkers  and  writers  of  this  genera- 
tion.   President  Olin's  health  was  such  that  he  was  un-  , 
able  to  give  instruction  in  the  class-room  during  Mr. 
Haven's  undergraduate  years.    Nearly  all  that  he  saw 
of  that  remarkable  man  was  seen  while  the  president 
was  conducting  prayers  in  the  chapel,  making  brief  ad- 
dresses to  the  students  on  matters  of  college  discipline, 
and  occasionally  preaching  sermons  of  the  highest  order. 
Dr.  Olin's  memoir  shows  that  these  years  often  appeared 
to  himself  barren  and  unfruitful  seasons  in  a  weary  life; 
but  there  must  have  been  many  around  him  then  to 
whom  his  life  and  woik  were  as  real  an  inspiration  as 
they  were  to  Mr.  Haven.    We  are  glad  to  show  this 
beneficent  action  of  a  masterly  intellect  and  a  noble 
Tieart  upon  the  plastic  soul  of  a  young  student  in  a 
note  written  during  the  last  days  of  the  college  year  of 
1845: 


College. 


55 


The  Baccalaureate  of  Dr.  Olin  was  the  greatest  intellectual  effort 
I  ever  listened  to.  His  text  was,  "  Put  ye  on  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
and  make  no  provision  for  the  flesh,  to  fulfill  it  in  the  lusts  thereof." 
It  was  a  sublime,  metaphysical,  poetical,  practical,  pious  discourse, 
by  far  the  ablest  that  I  have  ever  heard  from  him.  He  treated  of 
the  effects  of  making  Christ  the  All-in-all,  the  guide,  director,  sus- 
tainer,  in  a  most  sublime  manner.  Such,  he  said,  "  are  carried  for- 
ward on  the  surge  of  faith  by  almost  a  predestination  of  the  affec- 
tions. They,  if  sluggish,  are  stirred  up  by  the  sight  of  the  crowns 
and  the  nodding  plumes  that  rise  up  behind  the  high  battlements 
they  are  to  overleap."  He  then  spoke  of  Neology,  or  Transcendental- 
ism— a  refined  aristocratic  religion— in  terribly  sarcastic  language  ; 
of  the  errors  imbibed  by  those  who  lay  aside  Christ  at  the  beginning 
of  their  course  with  the  expectation  of  taking  up  the  cross  at  its  ter- 
mination, discarding  him  because  of  a  dreaded  interference  with 
their  ambitious  hopes.  It  was  the  mighty  production  of  a  mighty 
mind. 

And  this  is  complemented  by  what  he  says  on  read- 
ing Olin's  sermon,  "  The  Relation  of  Christian  Principle 
to  Mental  Culture 

What  a  sermon  !  How  crowded— jammed  almost  to  a  state  of  ' 
suffocation— are  its  fiery  thoughts  !  What  fullness  and  power  !  Of 
all  the  preachers  I  have  ever  heard  he  is  the  only  one  that  always 
"  seems  superior  in  his  thoughts."  No  matter  how  grand,  lofty,  or 
weighty,  he  takes  them  up  as  a  "very  little  thing,"  and  handles 
them  as  mere  toys.  He  seems  to  see  'way  round  his  subject,  to 
comprehend  at  a  glance  the  whole,  and  its  bearings,  minute  or 
weighty,  to  every  other  subject.  What  a  force  he  applies  to  these 
weapons  of  the  brain  in  discharging  them— the  roar  and  shaking 
attendant  on  the  discharge  of  heavy  artillery,  the  fire  and  smoke  and 
impetuosity — all  appear  in  his  utterance  of  mighty  truths.  They  fall 
not  cold  and  calm  from  his  lips,  but  seem  hurled  thence  by  the  ex- 
plosive action  of  the  soul,  driven  forth  with  fury  and  fire,  and  yet 


56  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

with  a  directness  of  aim  that  is  sure  of  sending  them  through  and 
through  the  mark. 

It  would  be  unjust  to  suppose  that  Mr.  Haven  did 
not  value  very  highly  other  professors,  concerning  whom 
less  is  said  in  his  papers.  His  opinion  of  Professor 
Smith  was  so  high  that  he  instantly  wrote  to  some  of 
the  trustees  in  favor  of  his  exaltation  to  the  presidency, 
when  the  sudden  death  of  the  lamented  Olin  left  that 
responsible  position  vacant.  These  circumstances  com- 
bine to  show  that  Mr.  Haven  was  happy,  and  felt  his 
happiness,  in  the  instructors  of  his  college  years. 

Of  his  own  diligence  in  using  his  opportunities 
there  can  be  no  doubt.  His  classmates  have  borne 
the  most  honorable  testimony  to  the  zeal  and  success 
with  which  were  performed  the  tasks  to  which  he 
was  put.  Nor  does  the  Journal,  wherein  he  minutes 
down  his  daily  defeats  and  successes,  yield  even  the 
suspicion  of  any  neglect  of  this  nature  in  Middletown. 
On  the  contrary,  it  bears  witness  more  than  once  to  the 
•  fact  that  his  application  and  steadiness  had  been  such 
that  he  had  no  reproaches  on  that  head  to  undergo  from 
any  quarter.  Among  the  faults  which  he  repeatedly 
confesses  this  is  never  mentioned.  Self-blame  arises 
only  when  he  reflects  that  the  mainspring  of  his  devo- 
tion to  work  has  oftener  been  ambition  than  consecra- 
tion to  Christ,  that  he  has  sometimes  aimed  rather  to 
excel  others  in  scholarship  than  to  gain  this  treasure  for 
its  own  sake. 

That  he  did  not  rate  his  diligence  or  attainments  too 
highly  appears  from  the  fact  that  the  college  authorities 


College. 


57 


agreed  with  him  in  their  estimate  of  his  standing.  His 
first  appearance  in  the  pubHc  exercises  of  the  Univer- 
sity was  in  the  junior  exhibition.  In  one  of  his  letters 
he  sets  the  matter  forth  with  some  detail  : 

It  was  my  first  appearance  before  a  Middletown  audience,  and  I  tried 
to  do  justice  to  my  aristocratic  breeding  and  family  position.  We  had 
a  great  audience,  great  pieces,  great  acting,  great  music,  and  great 
honors.  It  was  pronounced  by  the  Faculty  the  best  exhibition  that  has 
ever  occurred  here.  Our  music  was  superb,  as  it  should  be,  being 
Bostonian.  My  colloquy  was  not  acted,  to  the  great  joy  of  its  author 
and  the  great  sorrow  of  the  auditory,  if  their  assertions  are  true ; 
the  lateness  of  the  hour  and  the  unreadiness  of  some  of  the  speak- 
ers being  effectual  drawbacks.  I  don't  claim  the  authorship  on  the 
scheme,  such  is  my  extreme  modesty.  The  honor  of  writing  a  colloquy 
is  generally  assigned  to  one  of  the  witty  rather  than  one  of  the  schol- 
arly students,  and  therefore  is  not  considered  so  much  of  a  college  as 
class  honor.  Fales  Newhall  gained  great  applause  by  his  oration,  the 
third  in  honor,  and  by  some  placed  higher  in  composition.  For  my- 
self, I  don't  know  how  I  succeeded  unless  an  invitation  to  a  couple 
of  large  parties  at  two  professors'  houses  be  an  indication.  ...  I 
received  some  congratulations  and  complaints  from  some  who  did 
not  hear  me,  and  mingled  praise  and  blame  from  those  who  did  hear 
me,  mixing  in  their  judgments  charges  of  poetry  and  pedantry. 
One  fellow  said  it  was  the  best  he  had  ever  heard  here,  (a  foolish 
friend  this,)  and  another  said  it  was  all  stolen,  (a  false  friend  this,) 
so  that  between  them  all  I  found  myself  about  the  same  as  ever. 

The  subject  of  this  "  classical  oration "  was  The 
Adaptation  of  Grecian  Genius  to  Universal  Taste." 
The  colloquy  was  entitled  "  Humbug."  A  few  weeks 
later  he  spoke  Whittier's  "  Fratricide,"  "  a  terrific 
piece,"  in  the  annual  contest  in  declamation  between 

the  Sophomores  and  Juniors. 

3* 


58  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

It  would  be  interesting  could  we  give  a  full  and  de- 
tailed account  of  Mr.  Haven's  reading  and  incidental 
lines  of  study  during  his  college  residence  ;  but  this  can 
only  be  done  in  an  approximative  way.  There  is  rea- 
son to  think  that  he  did  not  continue  long  his  extra 
studies  in  French,  Latin,  or  Greek,  as  he  had  pushed 
them  in  his  freshman  year.  The  reason  is  that  his 
knowledge  of  French  never  was  much  wider  than  it 
must  have  become  as  early  as  that,  while  his  Latin  lit- 
erature never  ranged  much  beyond  what  he  must  have 
read  before  graduation.  This  becomes  yet  more  likely 
on  considering  that  he  was  a  member  of  one  secret  and 
one  public  literary  society  during  his  undergraduate 
days.  By  his  own  repeated  statements  he  gave  a  great 
deal  of  time  and  work  to  the  exercises  of  the  Eclectic 
Society.  His  general  reading  was  something  immense, 
even  to  unwisdom. 

We  shall  merely  record  the  books  which  he  notes  as 
read  in  his  Journal  for  the  year  beginning  May,  1845, 
and  ending  May,  1846.  There  is  no  declaration  that 
this  list  is  full  ;  but,  from  the  nature  of  the  case,  it 
must  be  nearly  so.  It  includes  Airs.  Child's  Philothea, 
Dickens'  Little  Nell,  Taylor's  Holy  Living  and  Dy- 
ing, Diary  of  Lady  Willoughby,  Emerson's  Essays, 
Brougham  on  the  Eloquence  of  the  Ancients,  Gibbon's 
Decline  and  Fall,  Landor's  Pericles  and  Aspasia,  The 
Letters  of  Eloise  and  Abelard,  Hood's  Poems,  Sis- 
mondi's  Italian  Republics,  Heyne's  Life,  Life  of  Dr. 
Arnold,  Bailey's  Festus,  Bush  on  Swedenborgianism, 
Junius'  Letters,  Cheever's  Lectures,  Bunyan's  Pilgrim's 


College.  59 

Progress,  Arnold's  Lectures  on  Modern  History, 
Shakspeare's  Plays,  Beecher's  Lectures  to  Young  Men, 
Vestiges  of  Creation,  Carlyle's  French  Revolution, 
Upham's  Life  of  Faith,  and  Coleridge's  works. 

It  will  be  seen  that  here  was  a  remarkable  amount  of 
valuable  reading  going  on.  There  is  no  ground  for 
thinking  that  he  perused  books  more  diligently  this 
year  than  during  any  other  part  of  his  residence  in  the 
University,  for  he  sometimes  complains  that  neither  his 
study  nor  his  reading  has  quite  its  once  perfect  relish. 
Thus  we  have  the  amplest  reason  for  saying  that  during 
his  college  days  he  confirmed  his  old  habit  of  much 
reading,  and  widened  his  already  considerable  acquaint- 
ance with  standard  English  authors.  But  one  can  hardly 
credit  the  idea  that  so  much  reading  could  have  been 
done  in  the  most  profitable  way,  or  that  such  a  medley 
of  literary  productions  could  have  been  healthy  fare,  or 
that  chance  did  not  dictate  much  that  he  read;  for 
assuredly  no  wise  teacher  would  think  such  a  combina- 
tion of  books  desirable. 

A  man's  relation  to  his  classmates  is  apt  to  show 
some  important  aspects  of  his  character.  Mr.  Haven 
had  the  respect  of  all  his  classmates,  and  the  sincere 
affection  of  the  ablest  and  purest.  His  special  friends 
appear  to  have  been  Mr.  A.  B.  Hyde,  now  Greek  Pro- 
fessor in  Alleghany  College  ;.  L.  F.  Jones,  now  a  lawyer 
in  California  ;  Oliver  Marcy,  now  Professor  of  Natural 
History  in  the  North  Western  University;  Fales  H. 
Nevvhall,  formerly  Professor  in  Wesleyan  University, 
and  then  President-elect  of  Ohio  Wesleyan  University ; 


GO 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


and  W.  M.  Ingraham,  now  a  lawyer  in  Brooklyn,  N.  "V., 
whose  sister,  Mary,  afterward  became  Mr.  Haven's  wife. 
The  man  who  could  live  four  years  in  the  close  inti- 
macy and  frequent  rivalry  which  college  life  almost 
compels,  and  retain  the  respect  and  affection  of  such 
men,  cannot  have  been  undeservin"-  of  hisfh  reeard. 
Gilbert  Haven  had  a  habit  of  proclaiming  his  class  the 
greatest  of  those  which  have  left  the  halls  of  Wes- 
leyan  ;  a  habit  which  has  sometimes  led  to  a  mistaken 
notion  of  its  relative  scholarship.  But  his  Journal 
shows  that  the  class  of  '45  was  more  brilliant  in  schol- 
arship than  his  own.  Yet  he  diligently  made  the  most 
of  all  the  virtues  of  his  own  class,  while  he  as  diligently 
concealed  its  faults.  One  amusing  illustration  of  this 
occurs  as  we  write.  Some  of  his  friends  must  have 
heard  him  tell  of  his  efforts  to  keep  a  certain  classmate 
from  intoxication.  One  evening  the  weak  but  much- 
tempted  man  insisted  upon  going  down  town,  and  Mr. 
Haven  rather  forced  his  somewhat  unwelcome  compan- 
ionship upon  his  friend,  and  took  care  that  another  ac- 
quaintance should  join  them.  But  unhappily  the  ally 
went  over  to  the  enemy  in  the  presence  of  temptation, 
so  that  the  young  collegian  had  two  rather  tipsy  fellows 
to  guide  home  that  evening.  Often  as  he  used  to  tell 
the  tale  it  may  vrell  be  doubted  whether  any  body  ever 
heard  him  drop  the  name  of  either  of  his  companions 
on  that  unhappy  lark.  This  fact  also  reveals  his  early 
possession  of  that  remarkable  gift  of  loving  men  in  spite 
of  their  vices,  and  trying  to  appeal  to  their  slumber- 
ing consciences  against  their  vicious  propensities.  Men 


College. 


6i 


cling  instinctively  to  those  who  are  at  once  morally 
stronger  than  they  and  sympathetic  with  the  noblest 
side  of  their  nature. 

The  letters  and  Journal  of  Mr.  Haven  may  be  searched 
through  in  vain  for  an  ill-natured  remark  about  any 
classmate  ;  and  even  that  depreciating  criticism  which 
so  abounds  in  colleges  has  no  place  there  ;  he  does  not 
reach  the  same  point  by  repeating  the  nipping  remarks 
of  others.  This  account  applies  to  all  his  Journals  from 
the  first,  in  1840,  to  the  last,  in  1879.  This  guarded  re- 
fusal to  judge  others  stands  in  the  most  striking  con- 
trast with  the  full,  free,  and  often  accusatory  criticism 
which  he  bestows  on  himself.  One  of  these  may  be 
cited  for  its  revelation  of  his  own  perception  of  his  per- 
sonal faults  : 

I  am  often  led  to  bemoan  my  life  and  search  for  the  peculiarities 
of  my  nature  that  so  color  my  conduct.  One  peculiar  trait  is  a  jo- 
cose, yet  half-earnest  conceit,  a  concealment  of  real  interest  under 
a  merry  mask.  My  vanity,  to  speak  in  plain  terms,  although  per- 
haps inferior  to  my  pride,  is  far  from  being  rightly  subjected. 
Every  man  should  possess  vanity,  yet  "not  enough  to  render  him 
tender  upon  subjects  where  virtue  only  should  shine.  My  love  of 
applause  combined  with  freedom  of  expression  sometimes  leads  me 
into  open  error,  an  overweening  desire  of  and  fastidious  reverence  for 
the  good  opinion  of  others.  My  pride  was  once  a  more  powerful 
prmciple.  Yet  this  pride,  when  exhibited.  I  am  wont  to  let  take  the 
form  of  arrogance,  which  has  a  tendency  to  excite  envy  and  anger. 
Another  fault  is  freedom  of  discussing  characters  which,  though  it 
seldom  makes  me  any  enemies,  does  prevent  me  from  forming  some 
friendships.  Persons  of  less  loquacity  and  sauciness  dislike  such 
strictures  and  wage  eternal  war  against  the  maker  of  them.  These 
three  are  my  most  mortal  faults. 


62 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


That  he  still  kept  up  his  early  habits  of  drawing  others 
about  him  appears  incidentally  from  a  letter  written 
home  in  1845  : 

Our  class  have  nearly  all  returned,  and  being  altogether  the  best 
class  in  college,  keeps  me  from  being  as  lonesome  as  I  had  expect- 
ed. I  have  never  seen  the  time  when  I  was  exceedingly  lonely  or 
heart-sick  since  I  have  been  here.  Fales  Henry  Newhall  and  my- 
self passed  the  first  two  weeks  very  pleasantly  together,  though  he 
has  sought  and  found  another  person  to  share  his  joys  and  sorrows, 
and  has  left  me  alone  in  my  glory,  not  undisturbed  with  visitants, 
for  they  cluster  in  and  around  myself  as  they  did  around  the  mad 
singer  in  ancient  times. 

There  is  the  true  Havenesque  touch  of  unconscious 
self-revelation,  graphic  and  beautiful. 

One  of  the  consequences  of  having  the  long  vacation 
fall  in  the  eight  weeks  succeeding  the  first  of  December, 
as  was  then  the  custom  at  Wesleyan  University,  was  that 
many  of  the  students  made  additions  to  their  funds, 
often  an  indispensable  necessity,  by  teaching  winter 
schools.  It  appears  that  Mr.  Haven  shared  these  du- 
ties  and  gains  in  his  Sophomore  and  Senior  years.  But 
he  was  probably  not  absent  from  the  regular  work  of 
the  University  more  than  six  weeks  all  told  for  the  two 
years  in  question.  Hence  it  conveys  rather  a  false  im- 
pression to  speak  of  him  as  "  keeping  up  with  his  class" 
while  engaged  in  pedagogical  duties,  since  the  class 
itself  was  doing  nothing  in  the  shape  of  college  studies 
during  more  than  two  thirds  of  those  periods. 

His  first  school  was  in  the  town  of  Saugus,  Mass.,  and 
was  kept  in  the  winter  of  1843,  '44-    Here  most  likely  he 


College.  63 

formed  the  acquaintance  of  Fales  H.  Newhall,  himself  a 
Saugus  boy,  and  destined  to  be  one  of  Mr.  Haven's  most 
beloved  and  Hfe-long  friends.  Many  were  the  evenings 
they  spent  together  in  the  humble  East  Saugus  par- 
sonage, then  occupied  by  Rev.  William  Rice.  Mr.  Rice 
had  been  recently  united  in  marriage  with  Miss  Catha- 
rine L.  North,  of  Lowell,  Mass.,  an  old  school  friend  of 
Mr.  Haven  in  the  Wilbraham  period.  She  was  worthy 
to  be  the  wife  of  the  brilliant  young  clergyman  whom 
she  had  married,  alike  through  her  intellectual  gifts  and 
her  perfectly  amiable  character.  Such  is  her  intellectual 
force  that,  throughout  a  married  life  of  now  nearly  two- 
score  years,  and  with  a  group  of  magnificent  children 
about  her  table,  she  has  ever  been  the  peerless  queen  of 
a  most  loyal  realm  there ;  and  such  her  wise  affection, 
that  never  could  loyalty  be  more  utterly  free  and  spon- 
taneous. Fortunate  young  men,  to  whom  such  a 
charming  household  was  to  give  such  a  hearty  welcome 
through  so  many  years  of  mingled  joy  and  sadness  ! 
Happy  home,  to  welcome  among  its  earliest  intimates 
two  such  royal  young  men  as  Fales  Henry  Newhall  and 
Gilbert  Haven  ! 

Brilliant,  indeed,  must  the  talk  have  been  around  the 
parsonage  fire  in  the  wintry  nights  so  long  since  lapsed 
into  silence  and  oblivion.  Literature,  education,  the- 
ology, reform  in  Church  and  State  ;  fun  without  end, 
and  hope  as  yet  undimmed,  made  those  fierce  months 
sweet  and  wholesome.  It  does  one  good  to  reflect  how 
bright  and  merry  the  scene  must  have  been,  while  the 
dancing  fires  contrasted  so  cozily  with  the  pattering  rain 


64 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


or  snow  against  the  pane,  and  the  little  candle,  per- 
chance, warmed  the  heart  of  some  weather-beaten 
mariner  as  his  ship  drove  onward  along  its  dreary 
ocean  pathway. 

It  was  a  matter  of  course  that  a  great  many  books 
were  read  or  talked  over  in  that  humble  parsonage  at 
East  Saugus;  the  most  entertaining  conversation  went 
on  concerning  all  sorts  of  novelties  in  science  and  liter- 
ature, while  graver  thoughts  would  be  called  out  by  the 
theological  questions  that  chanced  to  be  uppermost. 
The  host  was  very  certain  to  feed  with  fresh  facts  and 
arguments  the  bright  flame  of  devotion  to  all  the  true 
reforms  then  challenging  the  general  attention  of  the 
country  and  Church. 

During  the  last  year  of  Mr.  Haven's  college  life  an- 
other influence  began  to  attract  and  mold  and  repel  him, 
which  continued  to  operate  upon  him  in  these  different 
manners  until  the  end  of  his  career:  R.  W.  Emerson's 
poetry  and  skepticism.  It  seems  that  Mr.  Emerson, 
who  then  had  friends  residing  in  Middletown,  had  been 
invited,  through  Mr.  Haven's  influence,  to  deliver  na 
oration  at  Wesleyan  University  during  commencement 
week  in  1845.  Perhaps  Mr.  Haven's  record  of  that 
event  is  the  only  one  written  at  the  very  time  which 
has  yet  gone  abroad.    This  is  his  report : 

But  the  greatest  treat  was  a  lecture  by  Ralph  W.  Emerson,  on 
the  "Function  of  the  Scholar,"  most  epicurean,  full  of  rare,  exquisite 
specimens,  adorned  with  touches  of  eloquence,  wit,  humor,  and 
pathos.  It  was  a  most  brilliant  discourse,  every  way  worthy  of  the 
orator.    I  was  much  surprised  at  his  originality,  felicity  of  expres- 


College.  65 

sion.  He  caused  more  laughter  than  he  himself  desired  or  than 
suited  the  nature  of  his  topic.  Dr.  Olin  participated  in  the  mirth 
too  freely  for  his  dignity. 

The  next  winter  Mr.  Haven  was  teaching  at  Chelsea 
Point,  a  long  walk,  though  a  short  ride,  from  Boston.  It 
was,  no  doubt,  the  relish  he  had  acquired  for  that  won- 
derful genius  the  preceding  summer  and  earlier,  which 
drew  the  young  schoolmaster  from  his  suburban  home 
to  Boston  week  after  week  to  hear  a  course  of  lectures 
Emerson  was  then  giving  in  succession  on  Plato,  Sweden- 
borg,  Montaigne,  Bonaparte,  Shakspeare,  and  Goethe. 
How  persuasive  was  the  lecturer's  fascination  for  Mr. 
Haven  may  be  guessed  from  the  fact  that  he  makes  the 
following  statement  concerning  the  final  one :  "  In 
spite  of  the  terribly  fierce  and  cold  winds  and  snow 
that  filled  and  froze  the  air,  I  determined  to  go  to 
Boston  and  hear  Emerson's  last  lecture,  on  '  Goethe ;  or, 
The  Writer.'  " 

Of  course  nothing  was  more  natural  than  that  the 
themes  chosen  for  these  lectures  should  have  attracted 
the  young  collegian,  though  he  could  not  have  known 
enough  about  Goethe  and  Montaigne  to  have  appre- 
ciated the  exact  value  of  the  eloquent  lecturer's  state- 
ments on  and  his  appreciations  of  these  subjects.  It 
should  be  remembered  that  Emerson  had  not  then  soared 
up  to  his  own  exalted  position  in  the  empyrean  of  let- 
ters. He  was  still  trying  his  wings  and  seeking  his  path 
to  the  sun,  and  meantime  the  race  had  not  yet  died  out 
that  described  him  as  a  prophet  of  misty  incoherency. 
In  such  circumstances,  it  is  something  remarkable  that 


66 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


an  undergraduate  should  detect  his  transcendent  merits 
as  a  writer,  and  rank  him  immeasurably  above  Choate, 
Everett,  Whipple  and  Hillard.  As  worthy  of  note,  more- 
over, is  the  fullness  of  the  reports  given  in  the  Journal. 
One  has  only  to  read  these  swift  memoranda  and  com- 
pare them  with  the  essays  themselves  to  perceive  that 
the  hearer  has  easily  caught  up  the  most  salient  points 
in  each  lecture,  and  has  even  noted  down  the  most 
striking  touches  and  phrases.     And  this   record  had 
been  carried  out  of  the  Odeon  amid  the  excited  hum 
of  conversation,  out  into  the  icy  wind  sweeping  every 
rod  of  the  homeward  way,  or  into  the  tumultuous 
privacy  of  the  snow  storm,  and  in  some  cases  through 
the  visions  of  the  night  and  the  din  of  school  hours, 
before  the  reporter  could  command  ink  and  paper  for  his 
deliverance.     The  lecture  on  Plato  is  reported  more 
fully  and  with  more  details  than  any  other.    One  can 
see  that  the  lecture  must  have  made  an  overwhelming 
impression  on  a  sympathetic  mind,  to  be  carried  around 
and  delivered  in  this  way  so  safely.    Mr.  Haven  was 
inclined  to  pronounce  the  discourse  on  Goethe  the  best 
of  the  series,  a  fact  which  alone  shows  that  he  did  not 
know  enough  of  the  great  German  to  form  a  wise  judg- 
ment.   But  when  the  reporter  gives  his  own  criticisms 
on  the  lecturer's  account  of  Shakspeare,  we  see  at  once 
that  he  knows  where  he  stands.    He  says  :     The  lect- 
ure was  sparkling,  sagacious,  eloquent,  but  unsatisfac- 
tory.    Emerson  fell  below  his  subject,  and  failed  to 
grasp  Shakspeare  in  his  largeness  of  intellect.  This 
inferiority  was  striking,  and  great  Shakspeare  felt  the 


College.  67 

effects  of  it,  not  being  half  so  ably  treated  as  he  mer- 
ited. Yet  the  lecturer  abundantly  surpassed  common 
talkers ;  he  is  wonderful  for  his  perspicuity  and  vernacu- 
lar speech." 

It  is  worth  noting  that  Mr.  Haven  showed  so  early 
that  open-hearted  hospitality  for  good  thinking,  no  mat- 
ter what  the  repute  of  him  whose  thought  it  was.  But 
another  even  rarer  gift  among  those  who  have  given 
cheerful  entertainment  to  Emerson's  ideas,  was  the  skill 
to  take  only  what  was  good  and  serviceable  to  himself. 
This  Journal  shows  not  the  faintest  sign  that  Mr.  Haven 
was  ever  tempted  to  accept  Emerson's  estimate  of  Chris- 
tianity or  join  him  in  turning  his  back  on  Jesus  Christ. 
In  his  long  career  as  a  literary  man  Mr.  Haven  had  fre- 
quent occasion  to  speak  of  the  great  essayist's  high 
personal  character  and  characterize  his  writings.  Few 
authors  are  quoted  so  often  as  he,  and  none  of  our  age- 
has  more  unstinted  praise.  He  grew  in  time  to  know 
the  sage  of  Concord  personally,  and  enjoyed  the  great 
charm  of  his  conversation. 

Notwithstanding  all  these  natural  inducements  to  soft 
speaking,  Mr.  Haven  invariably  regarded  Emerson's 
strange  failure  to  appreciate  the  superhuman  character 
of  our  common  faith  as  a  serious  drawback  upon  his 
influence  as  a  writer.  He  was  never  tired  in  the  press 
or  the  pulpit  of  showing  up  this  terrible  deficiency.  Yet 
his  estimate  of  Emerson  grew  the  more  he  learned  of 
his  extraordinary  qualities.  He  once  told  his  son  that 
he  had  delivered  a  favorite  lecture  before  the  two  great- 
est men  in  America — General  Grant  and  R.  W.  Emer- 


68 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


son.  Those  who  are  famihar  with  his  daily  talk  know 
that  such  an  estimate  was  older  than  their  own  knowl- 
edge of  their  friend.  Tried  by  any  test  the  auditor 
could  bring  to  bear,  the  brilliant  lecturer  w^as  ignorant 
of  the  real  life  of  Christianity,  and  to  that  clear  convic- 
tion he  adhered  without  swerving. 

It  should,  perhaps,  be  noted  that  this  winter  he  list- 
ened to  much  first-class  lecturing  from  men  like  Pro- 
fessor Bush,  E.  P.  Whipple,  Rufus  Choate,  G.  S.  Hil- 
lard,  and  young  John  A.  Andrew,  the  future  war-gov- 
ernor of  the  old  Bay  State.  When  Mr.  Haven  was 
editor  of  Zion's  Herald,"  and  Mr.  Andrew  was  gov- 
ernor, their  relations  were  destined  to  become  confiden- 
tial and  for  awhile  even  intimate,  so  that  it  is  somewhat 
curious  to  note  his  careful  balancing  of  the  good  and 
poor  qualities  of  the  young  lawyer's  discourse.  He 
.likewise  attended  a  course  of  lectures  on  Geology  by 
Sir  Charles  Lyell.  It  is  curious,  in  view  of  his  usual 
indifference  to  such  matters,  to  observe  how  full  his 
Journal  suddenly  becomes  of  geological  facts  and 
theories. 

It  is  plain  that  he  stood  firmly  by  his  antislavery  con- 
victions during  his  residence  in  Middletown.  He  says 
during  the  presidential  canvass  of  1844:  ''Politics  run 
high  here,  with  the  hottest  of  Whigs  and  hotter  Demo- 
crats. A  few,  very  few  Birneyites  are  here.  Derision 
and  scoffing  are  two  strong  arguments  for  young  fellows 
to  withstand,  and  these  are  the  most  powerful  argu- 
ments their  opponents  here  propose.  Yet  as  a  whole,  I 
think  students  are  calmer  listeners  to  truth  than  any 


College.  69 

other  class  of  men  ;  it  may  be  because  they  are  not  in- 
volved in  action  through  such  discussions." 

About  a  year  later  he  says :  ''Anti-abolitionism  reigns 
so  strong  here  that  I  am  accounted  a  ranting,  fanatical 
Abolitionist  by  the  students,  and  ranked  with  another 
Bay-State  fellow  as  the  most  fanatical  students  in  col- 
lege. So  you  need  not  be  afraid,  mother,  that  I  shall 
become  pro-slavery.  My  position  has  been  assigned  me 
by  the  students,  and  I  don't  intend  to  dishonor  it." 

It  is  plain  that  all  this  implies  a  good  deal  of  earnest 
discussion  with  his  fellow-students  upon  the  general 
question  of -slavery,  and  the  duty  of  Christian  men  re- 
specting it.  Mr.  Haven  was  a  man  who  drew  others 
around  him  without  effort  on  either  side,  so  that  any 
views  he  held  were  pretty  sure  to  become  widely  known  ; 
meantime  his  high  personal  character  and  his  excellent 
scholarship  won  him  favorable  attention.  He  hoped  to 
make  some  converts,  or  at  least  to  make  men  feel  that 
this  was  no  light  and  easy  question  of  a  passing  hour. 
He  asked  his  mother  to  forward  regularly  one  of  the 
best  antislavery  papers,  so  that  it  might  be  kept  quietly 
on  the  files  of  the  reading-room.  ''  It  may  do  some 
good,"  was  his  remark  to  her. 

Like  many  other  northern  cities,  Middletown  had  a 
small  colony  of  black  people  ;  some  free-born,  and  some 
fugitives  from  southern  bondage.  After  the  mean  way 
of  those  days,  they  were  left  to  build  a  church  for  them- 
selves, and  worship  God  in  isolation.  It  was  like  young 
Haven  that  he  should  feel  his  soul  drawn  out  in  special 
kindness  toward  people  left  so  coldly  outside  the  pale 


70      •  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

of  Christian  fellowship.  Under  date  of  April  26,  1846, 
the  Journal  says:  Attended  Sabbath-school  at  the 
African  Church,  where  I  had  a  fine  class  of  young  ladies 
of  color,  who  were  ready  and  piquant."  One  feels  from 
the  tone  of  this  remark  that  the  young  collegian  had  so 
borne  himself  toward  his  class  that  they  must  all  have 
felt  in  all  his  ways  the  fulfillment  of  the  royal  law : 
"  Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbor  as  thyself."  That  he 
was  thinking  all  around  the  question  at  that  early  date 
appears  from  a  letter  to  his  mother  concerning  this 
matter: 

I  must  inform  you  of  the  elevation  to  which  I  have  been  raised, 
nothing  less  than  head  teacher  in  the  Sabbath-school  of  the  African 
Church.  Isn't  that  Abolitionism  enough?  Harboring  negroes  and 
minghng  with  them.  The  class  is  a  fine,  large  collection  of  ladies  of 
various  ages,  colors,  and  faces.  Some  are  handsome  and  some  are 
not  ;  of  all  shades,  from  the  color  of  this  ink  to  nearly  that  of  this 
paper.  I  shouldn't  wonder  if  I  should  bring  one  of  them  home  with 
me  next  August  as  a  bride.  They  think  very  much  of  me  and  I  of 
them.  Hope  you  will  prepare  to  receive  her  with  great  affection. 
Stranger  things  have  happened. 

It  is  pretty  evident  that  our  young  Abolitionist  had 
been  asking  himself  just  how  Christ  would  like  to  have 
those  poor,  outcast,  and  disfranchised  children  of  His 
treated,  and  how  he  himself  would  like  to  be  received 
were  he  black  of  hue  and  a  political  and  social  alien. 
The  answer  was  not  dubious  to  Haven,  and  hencefor- 
ward he  seems  to  have  kept  in  mind  the  memorable 

Inasmuch"  of  the  supreme  Judge  in  the  great  day. 
With  swiftly  darting  intuition  he  saw  that  many  who 


College.  71 

were  Abolitionists  would  be  startled  and  perhaps  scan- 
dalized by  any  logical  thoroughness  in  the  application 
of  their  own  principles.  Perhaps  the  note  of  miscege- 
nation was  sounded  in  the  letter  to  his  mother  partly  in 
order  to  see  what  sort  of  an  answer  would  be  returned 
from  so  thorough  an  Abolitionist  as  she. 

One  of  the  points  about  which  our  light  is  most 
abundant  during  Mr.  Haven's  stay  in  college  is  his 
religious  condition.  He  writes  concerning  that  in  near- 
ly every  letter  home,  and  especially  is  he  full  and 
minute  in  epistolary  correspondence  with  his  mother. 
The  student  who  had  such  a  jaunty  and  rollicking  air 
to  those  who  only  encountered  him  casually  on  the 
street  or  in  society  had,  nevertheless,  profound  religious 
convictions  to  shape  and  mold  his  earthly  life.  His 
papers  show  that  he  was  always  a  diligent  and  pious 
attendant  on  the  preaching  of  God's  word,  on  the  social 
prayer  and  class-meetings  in  college,  and  on  the  sacra- 
ment of  the  Lord's  Supper.  He  carefully  read  the 
Scriptures  in  private  for  his  own  edification  and  comfort, 
and  he  was  careful  to  find  time  for  pious  meditation 
and  private  prayer.  Those  who  have  been  misled,  by 
his  frank,  open,  unconventional  character,  into  thinking 
him  either  irreligious  or  undevout  would  only  need  to 
read  his  letters  and  Journal  to  see  how  utterly  this 
idea  is  a  mistake.  He  shows,  in  the  most  uncon- 
strained way,  the  depths  of  a  soul  singularly  religious ; 
much  even  of  his  college  life  was  a  panting  after  the 
living  God. 

During  the  greater  part  of  that  period  he  was  in 


72  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

a  condition  not  wholly  satisfactory  to  himself;  though 
most  of  the  trouble  was  the  result  of  his  intense  devo- 
tion to  the  regular  and  extraordinary  lines  of  study 
he  followed.  He  had  somehow  acquired  the  habit  of 
doing  several  apparently  conflicting  things  at  the  same 
time.  His  room  was  one  of  the  most  frequented  ones 
in  college,  and  yet  he  contrived  to  do  his  work  with 
fidelity  while  men  were  coming  and  going.  So  he  con- 
trived to  find  time  for  his  religious  duties  amid  a  throng 
of  studies  and  readings.  It  would  seem  but  natural 
that  he  must  sometimes  have  suffered  under  distraction 
of  heart  and  head  in  such  shifting  circumstances,  but 
there  was  something  in  his  make-up  through  which  he 
could  pass  to  the  most  diverse  employments  without 
mental  friction  or  moral  jar.  In  later  years  he  used  to 
bring  his  joking  and  praying  nearer  together  than  fas- 
tidious people  liked,  but,  nevertheless,  he  was  wholly  in 
^.the  prayer  as  well  as  wholly  in  the  jest.  It  seems  that 
he  deemed  himself  too  apt  to  avoid  directly  condemning 
sin  in  others,  partly  because  he  had  a  horror  of  any 
thing  Pharisaical,  and  partly  because  that  course  fell 
in  with  his  instincts.  Sometimes  he  suspected  himself 
of  caring  too  greatly  for  the  favorable  opinion  of  evil- 
doers. Ambition  was  sometimes  so  powerful  in  his 
breast  that  he  questioned  his  own  willingness  to  obey 
God  in  all  things. 

During  the  last  term  of  his  Junior  year  religion  was 
at  a  very  low  ebb  in  college,  a  state  of  things  which  he 
describes  in  a  deeply  interesting  letter  to  his  mother  in 
these  words : 


College. 


73 


Spiritually  I  cannot  assert  great  increase  or  complete  healthiness. 
The  engrossing  character  of  my  studies,  that  laxness  which  any 
slackening  in  them  produces,  together  with  the  general  declension 
among  the  students,  have  a  great  tendency  to  deprive  me  of  perfect 
peace  and  purity.  The  difference  between  this  term  and  a  year  ago 
is  marked.  Men  who  then  professed  to  enjoy  the  blessing  of  sane-  j 
tification  and  manifested  that  enjoyment  with  something  better  than ./ 
words,  now  attend  ball-rooms  and  dancing  schools,  and  converse 
freely  on  subjects  as  far  from  holiness  and  heavenly  mindedness  as 
the  lowest  devil  is  from  the  loftiest  angel.  Great  darkness  over- 
hangs and  infests  the  souls  of  most  of  the  professors  of  religion. 
Accustomed  from  our  conversational  associations  to  discuss  such 
subjects,  we  probably  discern  our  own  faithlessness  better  than  most 
churches  like  gloomily  situated.  I  would  not  have  you  infer  from 
my  remarks  that  I  have  visited  these  interdicted  places,  for  I  have 
thus  far  avoided  them,  but  some  among  us  have.  My  heart,  though 
deficient  in  practical  holiness,  is  not,  I  hope,  entirely  depraved,  j 
Sometimes  I  have  clear  visions  of  God  and  religion,  and  feel  greatly- 
encouraged. 

Things  went  on  in  this  general  style  for  several 
months  longer.  When  Mr.  Haven  returned  to  college 
after  the  conclusion  of  his  winter's  teaching  at  Chel- 
sea Point,  the  term  was  about  three  weeks  under  way, 
and  suddenly  a  wonderful  change  in  the  situation 
showed  itself.  We  cite  his  own  account  from  letters 
to  the  home  circle : 

I  arrived  here  at  noon,  and  about  half  an  hour  later  attended  a 
general  class-meeting,  where  the  strangest  sights  and  sounds  as- 
sailed my  senses.  I  saw  and  heard  those  who  had  been  esteemed 
leaders  in  the  ranks  of  sin  avowing  their  love  for  God  and  their  faith 
in  Christ.  I  had  received  no  intimation  of  such  a  spiritual  earth- 
quake till  just  before  I  got  here,  when  I  found  the  power  of  sin 


74 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


almost  entirely  destroyed  in  college.  A  great  revival,  by  far  the 
greatest,  it  is  said,  that  has  ever  occurred  in  college,  is  in  progress. 
About  twenty-five  of  the  students  out  of  forty  nonprofessors  have 
embraced  religion,  and  among  them  all  who  had  been  eminent  in 
vice,  and  who  were  the  popular  leaders  in  wickedness.  You  may  be 
assured  the  news  was  startling,  and  came  across  my  lukewarm 
heart  like  streams  of  intensest  heat.  The  revival  has  extended 
through  the  town,  and  about  fifty  are  forward  for  prayers  every 
night.  The  church  and  college  are  all  alive  with  spirituality.  Prayer- 
meetings  crowded  every  noon,  and  preaching  and  prayers  every 
night  at  the  church  ;  religion  the  only  subject  of  thought  and  conver- 
sation, and  spiritual  enjoyment  the  life  of  every  soul.  Such  a  scene 
might  have  tempted  me  to  write  home  sooner,  but  I  was  occupied 
with  duties  which  I  knew  were  necessary  for  me  to  perform  in  order 
to  obtain  my  right  place  before  God  and  those  who  had  their  eyes 
open  to  the  omissions  as  well  as  the  misdoings  of  Christians. 

These  words  tell  their  own  story  too  plainly  to  need 
any  addition,  except  to  say  that  this  marvelous  revival 
went  forward  for  some  weeks  more.  On  April  lo, 
1846,  he  writes  : 

The  revival  has  not  yet  ceafsed,  having  continued  for  over  two 
months  with  nightly  meetings,  convictions,  and  conversions.  Over 
two  hundred  have  been  converted  at  the  Methodist  Church,  and 
about  three  fourths  of  these  have  joined  the  church.  A  work  of 
such  power  and  depth  I  have  never  seen.  The  whole  revival  has 
been  attributable  under  God  to  the  efforts  of  Christian  students. 
The  college  has  been  its  center. 

This  deepening  of  his  religious  life  gave  fresh  intens- 
ity to  another  question,  which  had  for  months  and 
months  been  haunting  the  thoughts  of  the  ripening  stu- 
dent.   What  should  he  do  with  the  education  so  nearly 


College. 


75 


and  dearly  won  ?  How  great  his  perplexity  was  appears 
in  one  of  his  letters  to  his  parents  : 

My  desire  for  a  theological  course  has  never  been  strong,  indulged 
only  as  a  last  resort.  I  should  prefer  some  business,  or  academic 
teaching,  or  something  that  would  introduce  me  to  my  profession 
either  by  education  or  practice.  The  knowledge  I  have  gained  here 
has  not  been  of  a  theological  character,  so  that  I  am  no  more  fit  to 
teach  Christians  than  when  1  first  graduated  from  Wilbraham  or 
Tenney's.  If  I  could  become  a  teacher  where  I  could  improve  my 
talents  it  would  satisfy  me,  but  to  join  Conference  to-morrow,  to  take 
charge  of  a  church,  to  go  to  leading  old  men  and  women,  young  men 
and  maidens,  in  the  ways  of  holiness  seems  altogether  too  serious 
business.  I  think  often  and  solemnly,  but  never  decisively,  on 
these  questions.  Would  I  could  be  driven  into  something  I  could 
engage  in  eagerly  and  delightfully  !  If  I  preach  (how  strange  that 
sounds  !)  where  shall  I  go  ?  To  the  New  England  Conference  ?  I 
couldn't  quite  do  that.  I  shall  run  out  West,  or  perhaps  South,  and 
turn  slave-holding  preacher.  I  should  not  stay  around  home  in  such 
circumstances.  You  can  form  no  idea  of  my  indecision  ;  it  torments 
me  day  and  night.  Shall  I  be  a  merchant,  lawyer,  preacher,  or 
teacher 

While  in  this  condition  of  perplexity  he  was  invited 
by  his  cousin,  E.  O.  Haven,  now  (not  now,  alas !)  Bishop 
Haven,  to  take  the  position  of  teacher  of  Greek  in 
Amenia  Seminary,  where  the  latter  was  then  principal, 
on  a  salary  of  $300  a  year,  with  free  bed  and  board. 
He  reports  this  offer  to  his  parents,  and  dutifully  asks 
their  counsel : 

Now  what  shall  I  do  ?  Shall  I  teach,  preach,  or  talk  law  and  poli- 
tics ?  Shall  I  become  president  of  a  college,  bishop,  or  president  of 
the  country.    These  are  the  ends  and  aims  of  the  three  professions. 


76 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


When  I  see  what  a  glorious  field  is  open  for  the  display  of  talent 
and  the  diffusion  of  righteous  principles  in  the  nation,  I  confess  I 
wish  to  be  a  statesman — this,  I  am  free  to  say,  is  the  devouring  pro- 
pensity— to  be  a  good,  efficient,  and  great  statesman.  When  I  see 
how  greatly  superior  are  the  necessities  and  claims  of  the  soul  .  .  . 
I  am  drawn  to  the  ministry,  not  called.  I  have  never  felt  what 
some  call  "  inspired  "  to  be  a  minister.  Nothing  more  than  a  moral 
duty.  And  this  duty,  from  my  education  or  nature,  always  appears 
less  than  the  moral  duty  connected  with  politics.  .  .  .  The  faculty 
at  Amenia  I  know.  One  is  my  classmate,  William  M.  Ingraham, 
and  one.  Cousin  Otis,  glorious  fellows. 

With  these  somewhat  novel  views  about  the  relative 
importance  of  the  two  fields  of  labor  which  mainly 
claimed  his  attention,  and  free  from  any  authoritative 
summons  to  ministerial  duties  such  as  would  have  left 
him  no  option  between  instant  obedience  and  conscious 
disobedience,  the  position  in  Amenia  naturally  attracted 
him.  It  would  furnish  him  a  useful  and  happy  field  of 
toil ;  it  would  give  him  pleasant  and  profitable  compan- 
ions, and  it  would  enable  him  to  study  himself  and  his 
work  with  due  caution  before  making  the  great  decision. 
He  was  also  attracted  to  the  department  proposed  to 
him,  saying  of  it :  The  department  is  the  pleasantest, 
I  think,  and  is  the  one  I  should  prefer.  For,  though  I 
could  not  shine  in  that  as  I  could  in  mathematics  and 
English  studies,  yet  it  would  benefit  me  more,  and  be 
greatly  superior  in  its  pleasures."  So  he  resolved  to  go 
to  Amenia  las  Greek  teacher. 

It  is  manifest  from  several  indications  that  Mr.  Haven 
had  strong  hopes  of  leading  his  class  in  scholarship. 
Fales  Henry  Newhall  seems  to  have  been  the  rival  he 


College. 


77 


chiefly  feared.  In  March,  1844,  he  wrote  to  his  sister: 
"  I  will  give  you  my  position  in  the  class  last  term. 
Haven  was  first,  Newhall  second,  and  S.  F.  Beach,  the 
little  fourteen-years  old  boy,  our  usual  leader,  was 
third.  The  same  Haven  was  alone  in  the  first  divis- 
ion in  Professor  Holdich's  department,  speaking  and 
writing."  When  the  appointments  for  commencement 
came  out,  however,  the  "  little  boy  "  was  still  ahead, 
and  Mr.  Haven  comments  in  his  next  epistle  in  these 
terms : 

The  fate  of  us  youthfuls,  at  least  so  far  as  commencement  goes,  is 
decided.  Beach,  valedictorian  ;  Fales,  salutatorian  ;  and  I  take  the 
same  place  Otis  occupied,  the  Philosophical  Oration.  The  arrange- 
ment surprised  the  class  and  college,  and  is  pronounced  by  all  unjust. 
It  makes  but  little  difference,  however.  The  hours  are  numbered, 
the  days  departing,  and  I  must  be  something  or  nothing.  College 
positions  avail  nothing  if  education  has  not  been  gained.  That  I 
have  not  misimproved  my  time  intellectually  my  progress  in  extra 
studies,  greater  than  that  of  any  other  in  the  class,  will  testify.  I 
have  read  so  much  that  I  can  continue  without  a  teacher  in  French, 
German,  Hebrew,  and  Italian,  besides  knowing  as  much  about  my 
text-books  as  any  other.  The  rivalry  has  i)een  close,  with  a  differ- 
ence of  but  one  or  two  on  the  whole  course  between  us  three. 

This  was  written  to  friends  who  might  be  grieved  that 
he  had  not  snatched  the  highest  honor  in  the  rivalries 
of  college  life.  The  private  Journal  is  pitched  in  an- 
other key  : 

No  one  has  studied  harder,  easier,  accomplished  or  wasted 
more.  Intellectually,  I  condemn  not  myself  ;  religiously,  I  mark 
but  slight  advance.  My  soul  has  been  outstripped  by  my  intel- 
lect, ambitioruhas  swallowed  up  grace.    Vain  must  be  my  acquire- 


78  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

ments,  honors,  or  dishonors,  if  holy  love  and  fear  do  not  rule  and 
reign  in  the  heart. 

This  closing  disappointment  left  not  a  touch  of  bit- 
terness in  his  own  memory,  since  the  final  entry  in  the 
Journal  is  in  this  tone  : 

I  have  delighted  greatly  in  the  social  intercourse  I  have  enjoyed. 
It  has  been  of  a  high  order.  Some  of  the  fellow-talkers  have  been 
as  subtile,  original,  humorous,  amiable,  jovial,  whole-souled  fellows 
as  this  world  is  honored  with  ;  such  as  Hyde,  Newhall,  Brigham, 
Jones,  Ingraham,  IMartindale,  Genung,  and  little  Sam  Beach,  with 
others,  will  cling  to  my  memory  while  time  allows.  And  the  utter 
freedom  from  care  has  been  no  small  ingredient  in  my  cup  of  pleas- 
ure, and  then  the  jocose  scrapes,  harmless  and  mirthful,  the  spicy 
conversations,  and  the  pleasant  rambles  and  the  campus  lounges  did 
not  make  our  happiness  less.  Yesterday  the  £-ra?i^e  finale  occurred. 
The  speeches,  lauded  to  the  skies  by  the  hearers,  went  off  gracefully. 
The  music  played  divinely,  and  all  went  spiritedly  from  Fales  to  Sam. 

...  To  God  I  commit  my  spirit.  Rocked  and  tossed  as  I  have 
been,  to  him  would  I  look  for  direction,  in  him  would  I  trust  for  sup- 
port. But  wherever  tossed,  I  shall  ever  place  highest  in  memory, 
sacredest  in  my  heart,  frequentest  in  my  recollections,  the  days  that 
have  just  terminated.  In  the  light  of  this  epoch  I  shall  walk  through 
whatever  darkness  may  inclose  my  future  pathway. 

Mr.  Haven  was  graduated  on  August  5,  1846;  his  was 
the  Philosophical  Oration,  and  his  theme,  The  Iden- 
tity of  Philosophy." 


Teacher  and  Principal. 


79 


CHAPTER  V. 

TEACHER  AND  PRINCIPAL. 

Amenia  Seminary  —  Teaching  Greek  —  His  Associates— Social  Life— Out  of  Doors 
—Made  Principal — Success  and  Difficulties— Growth  in  Scholarship — Reading— Theol- 
ogy—The  Life  Spiritual— His  Vocation— First  Preaching— License  to  Preach— Vacation 
Days  and  Society — Death  of  Friends — Leaves  Amenia. 

TEN  days  after  his  graduation  at  Wesleyan  Uni- 
versity Mr.  Haven  was  discharging  the  duties  of 
teacher  of  Greek  and  German  in  Amenia  Seminary,  at 
Amenia,  Dutchess  County,  N.  Y.  It  has  been  so  often 
stated  that  he  was  teacher  of  Latin  and  Greek,  that  we 
quote  from  a  private  letter  of  Bishop  E.  O.  Haven  re- 
specting his  cousin's  position  in  the  school :  I  pro- 
cured his  services  as  teacher  of  Greek.  He  did  not 
teach  Latin,  but  gave  some  instruction  in  German,  and 
now  and  then  took  an  extra  class  in  some  other  depart- 
ment." 

Amenia  Seminary  was  an  institution  of  about  the 
same  grade,  general  aims,  and  organization  as  Wilbra- 
ham  Academy,  where  Mr.  Haven  had  been  converted. 
Its  chief  founders  and  patrons  were  found  among  cer- 
tain Methodist  families  of  the  region — the  Ingrahams, 
the  Reynolds,  the  Hunts,  and  the  Vails.  Most  con- 
spicuous among  these  was  Mr.  George  Ingraham,  Esq., 
then  President  of  the  Board  of  Trustees.  He  was  the 
father  of  a  large  and  intelligent  family  of  children,  of 
whom  William  Murphy  Ingraham  had  been  Mr.  Ha- 


8o 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


ven*s  classmate  in  college,  and  was  now  to  be  his  asso- 
ciate in  teaching,  and  life-long  friend,  while  a  daughter, 
Mary,  then  fifteen  years  old,  was  yet  to  be  a  fit  wife  for 
the  young  stranger.  The  seminary  had  then  enjoyed 
the  services,  as  teacher  or  principal,  of  some  of  the  no- 
blest young  men  in  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church. 
Bishop  D.  W.  Clark  had  been  principal  there  from  1837 
to  1843  '■>  Dr.  Joseph  Cummings,  for  many  years  Presi- 
dent of  Wesleyan  University,  held  this  position  from 
1843  to  1846;  Bishop  Erastus  Otis  Haven  became  his 
successor  in  1846,  and  continued  principal  until  1848; 
Bishop  Gilbert  Haven  followed  his  cousin,  and  retained 
the  office  until  1851  ;  in  that  year  the  office  passed  into 
the  hands  of  Dr.  John  W.  Beach,  the  actual  President  of 
Wesleyan  University,  who  was  to  be  followed  by  Bishop 
Cyrus  David  Foss.  The  fact  that  so  many  very  able 
men  have  been  connected  with  the  school  evinces  its 
high  character,  and  shows  that  Mr.  Haven  was  now  in- 
vited to  a  position  where  high  ability,  tact,  and  charac- 
ter would  be  needful  for  success.  Few  such  schools  can 
show  a  similar  array  of  eminent  names  among  their  in- 
structors. 

Meantime  the  young  teacher  of  Greek  and  German, 
all  unconscious  of  the  social  and  professional  destinies 
impending  over  him  under  the  sure  hand  of  a  loving 
God,  was  standing  there  in  Amenia,  on  August  17, 
1846,  applying  his  own  eyes  to  the  novel  scenes  before 
him  in  order  to  reproduce  them  vividly  in  his  Journal, 
not  without  some  troublesome  touches  and  flashes  of 
home-sickness : 


Teacher  and  Prinxipal. 


8i 


I  am  driven  away  from  home  scenes  to  engage  in  an  entirely  new 
business,  in  an  entirely  new  region.  Here  I  am,  pushed  down  into 
this  Sleepy  Hollow,  embosomed  in  high  wheat  and  oat-crowned 
hills,  resting  in  drowsy  magnificence  amid  beauties  of  every  natural 
order.  The  place  is  very  pleasant,  and  little  troubled  by  the  vandal 
or  connoisseur  hand.  It  is  engirt  with  high  hills,  which  shut  in  the 
vision  and  contract  it  within  limits  so  narrow  that,  to  one  used  to 
the  wider  range  of  Middletown,  it  seems  cell-like ;  still  it  is  pleasant. 
Rolling  hills  covered  with  vegetation,  the  loftiest  peaks  cultivated 
like  a  garden,  tall  forests  and  green  meadows,  make  the  scene  very- 
delightful  if  it  were  only  a  little  more  active  and  prosperous.  I  have 
indulged  in  some  home-sickness,  the  close  stillness  contrasting  so 
greatly  with  the  wide  activity  at  home.  Yet  I  think  I  shall  get  used 
to  it.  The  school  is  pleasant,  but  rather  small— about  seventy-five. 
I  have  looked  in  on  my  numerous  classes  with  much  pleasure.  The 
building  is  large,  a  hotel  in  the  center  of  a  little  village,  made  up  of 
little  houses ;  every  thing  on  a  diminutive  scale,  except  the  hills,  the 
landscape,  and  the  seminary.  It  is  a  delightful  rolling  country — 
meadows,  hills,  knolls,  mountains  crowned  with  grand  forests,  with 
wheat,  corn,  sheep,  and  pigs,  and  here  and  there  a  farm-house  full 
of  life  and  love.  Such  a  retired  place,  a  little  baby  of  towns  put  out 
into  the  countr}^  to  be  brought  up,  I  never  got  into. 

The  papers  of  Air.  Haven,  dating  from  the  days  of  his 
earher  connection  with  the  place,  show  that  he  had 
many  and  persistent  doubts  as  to  his  probable  relish 
for  his  ne>v  style  of  existence.  College  life  had  been  for 
him  such  a  scene  of  almost  unmingled  pleasure  and  suc- 
cess that  there  was  serious  danger  lest  any  exacting  rou- 
tine of  duty  should  prove  irksome.  Too  clear-headed 
to  suppose  it  possible  to  continue  longer  that  care-free 
and  merry  period,  he  was  so  sensitive  to  any  thing  disa- 
greeable in  his  external  world  as  to  make  the  transition 
4* 


82 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


from  one  position  to  the  other  perilous.  He  put  his 
own  feeling  as  he  looked  out  on  the  prospects  before 
him  in  the  seminary  into  Virgil's  line  : 

"  Superanda  fortuna  omnis  ferendo  est." 

He  speaks  of  his  days  as  wanting  the  free,  merry,  and 
manifold  delights  he  had  known  at  Middletown,  and 

gradually  changing  their  brightness  into  the  natural 
gloom  of  care-ridden  earth."  The  six  hours  of  teaching 
for  five  days  in  the  week,  the  social  demands  which 
were  made  upon  his  time,  the  accumulation  of  work, 
and  a  certain  want  of  strict  order  in  his  labors,  made 
him  feel  somewhat  overcrowded  with  employment  and 
poor  in  time.  Saturday  was  a  free  day  ;  but  it  was  not 
so  easy  to  take  care  of  it ;  for  he  says  of  one :  I  have 
spent  the  day  amid  old  and  new  Blackwoods',  Eras, 
Shakspeare,  and  Horace.  Truly  my  leisure  days  pro- 
duce no  more  fruit  than  my  busy  ones,  passing  reck- 
lessly, with  due  regard  to  the  present  moment,  but  with 
supreme  contempt  for  the  future.  So  I  go — lalnintur 
anni  fugaces — but  I  heed  them  not."  For  some  time 
the  utmost  he  ventured  to  hope  for  was  a  warm  after- 
glow of  the  lost  splendors  of  his  university  career,  with 
a  diminished  satisfaction  in  his  crowding  activities ;  and 
once  he  thought  he  had  reached  that  condition  :  The 
light  of  college  bliss  has  faded  into  this  twilight  —  a 
peaceful  Indian  summer  after  the  intense  heat  of  joy." 

But  gradually  there  dawned  upon  him  a  hope  of 
making  the  new  life  even  superior  to  the  old  one.  The 
first  suggestion  seems  to  have  come  from  the  better  ac- 


Teacher  and  Principal.  83 

quaintance  he  now  gained  with  his  cousin,  E.  O.  Haven, 
and  the  deepening  of  his  affection  for  Mr.  W.  M.  In- 
graham.  The  former  had  not  before  this  period  been 
much  within  the  reach  of  Gilbert's  interest  or  sympathy. 
The  two  had  seen  little  of  one  another,  and  that  only  in 
a  cursory  manner ;  now  for  the  first  time  they  had  the 
opportunity  for  such  thorough  knowledge  of  each  other 
as  served  to  turn  a  somewhat  dim  liking  into  strong  and 
life-long  affection.  Mr.  E.  O.  Haven  had  recently  mar- 
ried a  charming  daughter  of  Rev.  George  Coles,  of  the 
New  York  Conference.  The  gifts  of  his  new  kins- 
woman in  conversation,  literary  chitchat,  and  music 
made  Cousin  Gilbert's  days  brighter  and  less  monoto- 
nous. He  teased  her  for  music,  and  was  drawn  out  into 
many  an  hour  of  sportive  badinage.  He  was  immensely 
delighted  one  day  on  hearing  that  some  bumpkin  of  the 
neighborhood  had  been  making  inquiries  concerning 
Old  Mr.  Haven  at  the  seminary,  and  his  son  the 
teacher."  It  is  easy  to  fancy  the  filial  sentiments  which 
the  waggish  teacher  must  have  addressed  in  lavish  abun- 
dance to  his  new  mother,  who  was  several  years  younger 
than  himself. 

If  any  body  wishes  to  know  what  sort  of  a  man  Erastus 
Otis  Haven  was  in  those  days  of  his  unfolding  powers 
he  should  study  the  papers  of  Bishop  Gilbert  Haven. 
Soon  after  his  arrival  in  the  seminary  the  Journal  begins 
to  be  dotted  with  entries  like  this :  Otis  preached  a 
beautiful  sermon  to-day  on  '  How  shall  we  escape  if 
we  neglect  so  great  salvation.'  It  was  very  solemn 
and  effective."    Records  of  walks  in  company  with  Otis 


84  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

appear,  telling  where  they  went,  and  the  main  points  of 
their  talk  along  the  roads  and  through  the  solemn  old 
woods.  There  are  frequent  remarks  that  show  a  high 
estimate  of  his  cousin's  eminence  as  a  scholar,  brilliancy 
as  a  preacher  or  orator,  and  fine  social  gifts.  In  these 
natural  and  familiar  reports  of  their  relations  with  each 
other  one  comes  gradually  to  a  pretty  distinct  conception 
of  the  future  Chancellor  of  the  University  of  Michigan, 
and  Bishop.  It  is  noticeable  that  this  is  done  slowly, 
one  detail  coming  in  here  and  another  there,  but  evi- 
dently all  together  involved  in  Gilbert's  notion  of  his 
beloved  cousin.    Take  a  sample  : 

Enjoyed  a  vtry  delightful  conversation,  fringed  with  very  agreea- 
ble music,  in  Otis'  room.  Sister  Anna  read  Evangeline.  In  the 
course  of  the  evening  we  got  to  talking  of  emotions  of  sublimity. 
Underwood  asserted  that  there  is  no  sublimity  equal  to  that  of 
astronomy.  Otis  contended  for  the  superiority  of  the  imagination 
as  a  creative  faculty  over  that  function  which  explored  creations,  in 
producing  emotions  of  sublimity.  He  talked  long  and  eloquently  or 
the  theme,  arguing  subtilely  and  convincingly,  and  advancing  many 
fresh  and  striking  thoughts.  The  conversation  was  one  of  that  ear- 
nest and  yet  social  cast  that  keeps  every  body  awake  and  interested, 
joined,  of  course,  with  the  jesting  and  music  which  make  our  conver- 
sations so  agreeable. 

When  he  hears  that  Otis  is  going  to  leave  the  sem- 
inary he  gives  vent  to  his  feelings  as  follows  :  To  add 
to  my  cup  of  bitterness,  my  Cousin  Otis  leaves  also.  A 
better  man  never  wore  earth  about  him.  His  body 
is  almost  translucent,  so  radiant  is  the  inner  fire  ;  he 
has  active  and  very  warm  sympathies,  keen  and  fine- 
ly trained  intellect,  abundant  information  and  fluent 


Teacher  and  Principal. 


85 


expression,  subtle  and  quaintest  humor,  and  a  fondness 
for  acute  reasoning  and  vigorous  declamation.  I  am 
desperately  sorry  that  he  is  going."  And  later  he  says: 
"  Otis  delivered  his  farewell  speech  Tuesday  evening 
in  great  weakness  of  body.  He  came  near  fainting, 
and  was  so  weak  before  and  after  it  that  he  could  not 
attend  to  his  duties." 

As  Mr.  William  M.  Ingraham  had  been  a  classmate 
at  Middletown,  we  have  no  accounts  of  the  growth  of  their 
intimacy.  The  earliest  records  and  letters  show  it  to  have 
been  of  long  standing,  and  of  the  most  delicate  charac- 
ter. When  he  reaches  Amenia  Mr.  Haven  goes  out  to 
call  on  the  Ingraham  family,  and  is  delighted  with  them 
all ;  he  at  once  fancies  a  strong  resemblance  between 
their  mother  and  his  own.  The  earliest  mention  of  this 
friend  in  the  Journal  is  pitched  in  this  key : 

Last  Saturday  and  Sunday  I  went  with  my  bosom  and  brain 
friend,  William  M.  Ingraham,  to  Poughkeepsie  and  La  Grange. 
We  took  a  delightful  ride  through  a  farming  region  to  Mr.  Jackson's, 
an  uncle  of  his,  with  whom  we  spent  the  Sabbath.  Their  place  is 
very  fine ;  large  rolling  farms,  with  shaggy  hills  covered  with  forests, 
meadows  waving  with  grass  and  grain,  fine  horses  cantering  about 
the  fields,  the  air  full  of  life  and  song  and  fragrance.  I  was  inocu- 
lated with  the  desire  for  a  farmer's  life,  and  vowed  eternal  devotion 
to  its  pursuits.  We  laid  away  the  day  in  lavender,  so  delightfully 
did  it  glide  past.  ...  At  sunset  we  started  for  home,  twenty-five 
miles  away.  "The  moon  was  full  and  shining  clearly,"  and  the  air 
so  warm  and  balmy  and  cheerful,  that  I  was  almost  tempted  to  pass 
the  night  outdoors. 

Mr.  Haven's  favorite  and  most  frequent  companion 
on  such  excursions  and  in  his  frequent  rambles  around 


86 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


beautiful  Amenia  was  this  same  friend  of  his  heart. 
Their  relation  was  touched  off  once  for  all  in  the  earliest 
of  his  letters  from  Amenia  to  the  family  at  Maiden  : 

My  old  classmate  and  I  go  sauntering  here  and  there, 
visiting  his  mother,  eating  his  pears,  and  seeing  his — I'll 
not  say  what — for  Mrs.  C.  will  be  sending  it  back  within 
a  week,  and  put  me  in  a  beautiful  predicament." 

When  an  illness  forced  Mr.  Ingraham  to  give  up 
teaching,  his  friend  writes  : 

I  did  feel  bad  to  have  him  go,  for  he  has  been  a  connecting  link 
between  the  present  and  the  past,  has  kept  the  better  features  of 
college  days  ever  before  me,  and  afforded  me  rich  pleasure  inde- 
pendently of  common  memories.  We  have  walked  hundreds  of 
miles  in  company,  lain  together  hours  upon  hours  beside  brooks,  or 
in  solemn  forests,  and  read  and  talked  on  every  subject  of  a  spiritual 
or  intellectual  character.  The  richness  of  his  mind  was  but  half 
disclosed  at  Middletown,  and  he  has  been  constantly  opening  new 
mines,  and  disclosing  yet  purer  and  richer  veins,  or  amassing  from 
reading  or  reflection  fresh  treasures.  Through  him  and  Otis  I  have 
lost  all  yearnings  for  college  life.  What  need  of  sighing.^  Could 
any  place  out  of  Eden  afford  more  high  and  pure  delight  ? 

Two  or  three  other  times  Mr.  Ingraham  was  able  to 
render  brief  additional  services  as  teacher  in  the  semi- 
nary, and  it  is  fine  to  see  what  a  delicious  June-morning 
atmosphere  floods  the  pathway  of  Gilbert  Haven  on 
each  recurrence  of  such  good  fortune.  Under  date  of 
June,  1849,  says:  "  Underwood  has  gone,  Ingraham 
is  in  his  place.  It  was  like  getting  the  lost  piece  of  gold 
back,  worth  calling  in  all  the  neighbors  to  assist  my  re- 
joicings." 

Of  course,  no  place  could  long  be  dull  for  a  man  who 


Teacher  and  Principal. 


87 


had  such  an  enviable  faculty  of  turning  any  scene  and 
any  company  to  their  highest  uses.  What  he  was  doing 
with  these  chiefest  friends  he  did  in  a  large  measure 
with  all  around  him.  Among  the  teachers  of  the  sem- 
inary in  those  years  were  such  men  as  Rev.  Andrew  J. 
Hunt,  Mr.  T.  P.  Underwood,  Rev.  G.  G.  Jones,  Mr.  J. 
E.  Marsh,  and  Mr.  Alexander  Winchell,  the  well-known 
geologist :  and  nobody  would  be  so  sure  as  Mr.  Haven 
to  make  them  contribute  as  greatly  to  his  own  happi- 
ness as  he  would  be  sure  of  doing  to  theirs.  Here  is  a 
specimen  of  a  ramble  with  Hunt : 

This  morning,  the  fairest  spring  has  yet  put  on,  with  a  cool  north 
wind  playing  among  the  leaves,  while  a  warm  sun  is  looking  with 
ardent  fondness  on  the  earth,  made  out-of-doors  most  enticing. 
Hunt  and  myself  took  advantage  of  it,  wandered  off  into  a  nice 
shady  grove,  and  laid  off,  I  with  Blackwood,  and  he  with  "  Sartor  Re- 
sartus."  We  had  a  delicious  time,  sweeter  than  music  or  the  ringing 
of  eagles  to  the  ears  of  a  miser.  We  wandered  back  again  through 
most  glorious  scenery  ;  shaggy  mountains,  sunny  vales,  waving  grain 
fields,  creeping  streamlets,  all  glowmg  with  sunlight : 

"  What  a  day  this  is  ! 
Hills  and  vales  did  openly 
Seem  to  heave  and  throb  away 
At  the  sight  of  the  great  sky, 
And  the  silence,  as  it  stood, 
In  the  glory's  golden  flood, 
Audibly  did  bud  and  bud." 

No  doubt  Mr.  Haven  was  succeeding  in  his  work  as  a 
teacher  during  this  period,  or  his  days  would  not  have 
been  so  cheerful  as  they  were ;  but  he  does  not  dwell 
upon  such  topics  enough  to  show  what  his  strong  and 


88 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Aveak  points  in  teaching  were.  We  see  that  the  school 
was  in  a  prosperous  condition  under  the  firm  and  wise 
guidance  of  Principal  E.  O.  Haven.  The  variations  of 
the  patronage  in  numbers  and  character  are  noted,  and 
likewise  the  distracting  and  evil  influences  sometimes 
felt  there  ;  and  one  gladly  notices  that  a  high  religious 
spirit  prevails,  often  re-enforced  by  pervading  revivals  of 
religion.  It  is  stated  in  general  phrases  that  the  usual 
examinations  and  exhibitions  go  off  well;- but  on  two 
occasions  something  more  definite  is  set  down  in  the 
most  impartial  manner.  In  July,  1848,  he  says:  ''The 
examination  went  off  well.  Brother  Cummings  was  the 
principal  examiner,  though  not  properly  on  the  com- 
mittee. They  gave  me  some  credit  for  the  appearance 
of  my  classes,  though  they  took  the  edge  off  some  of  it 
by  suspicious  remarks."  A  year  later  he  writes:  ''The 
examination  was  very  good  according  to  the  opinion  of 
the  committee,  of  whom  was  Professor  Smith  of  Wes- 
leyan  University.  Foss  [William  Jay,  a  younger  broth- 
er of  Bishop  Foss,]  gave  a  fine  valedictory  ;  he  is  one  of 
the  most  promising  scholars  I  have  seen." 

The  best  evidence  of  his  high  success  as  teacher  is 
found  in  the  fact  that  he  was  made  principal  when  ill 
health  forced  his  cousin  Otis  to  resign  the  position,  in 
1848.  W^hen  the  suggestion  was  made,  Mr.  Haven,  while 
relishing  the  honor  of  such  an  offer  within  two  years 
after  his  graduation,  and  conscious  of  the  high  dignity 
of  the  place,  hesitated  somewhat  at  assuming  such  re- 
sponsibilities, since  it  would  detract  from  his  ease  and 
add  to  his  cares.    The  Journal  says,  May  9,  1848  : 


Teacher  and  Principal. 


89 


To-day  the  trustees  offered  me  the  principalship.  I  accepted  it 
for  this  time  ;  and,  if  I  please  and  they  also,  for  an  indefinite  time.  I 
shrink  from  accepting  the  office.  The  burdens  are  great,  the  pleas- 
ures few.  It  confers  some  reputation,  but  is  only  useful  as  a  pass- 
port, not  as  a  permanency.  I  hope  I  shall  do  well  in  it,  for  my  own 
sake,  and  for  the  school's  sake.  It  will  bring  out  what  talents  I 
possess.  I  feel  stricken  in  heart  while  looking  at  it  and  the  future. 
O  may  I  ever  apply  to  God  for  direction,  and  find  safety  and  success 
through  him  !  Grief  at  the  loss  of  my  old  associates  wears  away  my 
soul.  May  God  bless  these  old  friends  !  My  shrinking  at  coming 
responsibilities  deepens  the  gloom.  Winchell  is  coming,  and  A.  J. 
Hunt  is  to  take  Ingraham's  place. 

Of  course  there  could  be  nothing  very  novel  or  unex- 
pected in  the  work  of  his  new  office  for  Mr.  Haven. 
He  had  seen  the  working  of  the  school  for  two  years 
in  a  subordinate  position ;  but  he  had  been  on  such 
confidential  terms  with  his  cousin  that  he  must  have 
become  familiar  with  all  the  details  of  its  administration. 
His  talents  for  business  would  find  full  play,  and  his 
tact  in  moving  men  with  him  would  make  admirable 
success  possible.  Young  as  he  was,  and  without  experi- 
ence in  such  business,  he  had  the  rare  art  of  making 
every  body  about  him  work  easily  and  with  pleasure. 
He  formed  the  most  cordial  relations  with  all  the  other 
teachers,  and  gave  them  all  possible  encouragement  in 
their  work.  The  attendance  of  students  was  unusually 
large  during  the  years  Mr.  Haven  was  principal.  More 
than  one  hundred  were  enrolled  in  the  fall  term  of  1848. 
The  next  term  the  school  was  the  largest  that  had  then 
been  known  there — one  hundred  and  eighty-three  in  all. 
Many  applications  were  rejected  for  want  of  room.  In 


90  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

the  winter  term  of  1850  the  number  of  students  was  one 
hundred  and  seventy.  The  other  terms  of  the  year  were 
always  marked  by  a  diminished  school,  though  it  was 
never  small.  His  success  was  so  marked  that  when  he 
expressed  a  desire  to  lay  down  his  duties,  in  1850,  the 
trustees  resolutely  set  their  faces  against  it,  and  in- 
creased his  salary  to  secure  his  services  for  the  future. 
Much  of  his  skill  lay  in  the  power  to  create  a  genial 
atmosphere  in  the  entire  school.  He  writes  to  his  cous- 
in Otis  in  the  autumn  of  1848  : 

I  make  out  to  replace  you  by  new  compeers  as  fine  as  fine  can  be 
after  the  perfect.  We  have  quite  social  seasons,  as  merry  as  larks 
and  grave  as  owls.  I  suspect  the  gladness  diffused  through  our 
circle  spreads  to  hearts  beyond  the  charmed  line,  for  the  students 
appear  as  happy  as  the  teachers.  Every  body  seems  to  be  in  good- 
humor,  and  some  take  joyfully  the  spoiling  of  their  rooms,  which 
cannot  be  ascribed  to  any  other  cause  than  the  central  one  ;  all 
these  satellites  and  planets  lift  their  sides  toward  the  sun,  and  are 
never  in  eclipse.  Some  are  always  in  conjunction,  not  with  the  sun, 
but  with  each  other. 

In  speaking  in  these  glowing  terms  of  the  condition 
and  work  of  the  school  under  Mr.  Haven's  management 
we  do  not  affirm  that  he  escaped  all  difficulties.  He 
could  not  so  rob  students  of  their  faults  as  to  escape  the 
burden  of  rebuking  the  evil,  scolding  the  idle,  and  stimu- 
lating the  lazy.  Now  and  then  he  has  to  write  some- 
thing like  this:  ''The  last  part  of  the  term  has  been 
rather  troublesome.  Some  troubles  were  generated  con- 
cerning the  exhibition  and  music,  but  all  passed  off 
pleasantly."    Once  it  even  taker  this  shape:  "I  have 


Teacher  and  Principal.  91 

had  to  dismiss  three  boys  for  throwing  a  stove  down 
stairs.  It  has  given  me  lots  of  energy,  and  so  has  done 
me  good  like  a  medicine."  Yet  he  was  obliged  to  con- 
fess before  long  that  this  stimulus  failed  him :  "  Some 
troubles  arose  about  the  expelled  boys.  They  dis- 
turbed me  very  much.  I  have  been  very  anxious  and 
care-worn,  but  feel  better  now."  The  prospects  for  the 
next  term  were  not  very  flattering,  and  some  thought  the 
fault  was  his.  Though  he  did  not  admit  the  justice  of 
their  blame,  he  suffered  under  it.  His  real  piety  shows 
its  brightness  at  such  times.  No  mention  of  his  foes  by 
name,  no  eagerness  to  vindicate  himself  to  others,  but 
merely  a  naked  statement  of  the  facts,  and  a  prayer  or 
two.  I  hope  things  will  turn  out  well.  I  pray  for 
wisdom,  grace,  and  humility."  Such  things  always  left 
a  shadow  spread  over  the  heart  of  Mr.  Haven  ;  hence  it 
is  no  surprise  to  find  him  writing  a  little  afterward :  I 
have  felt  very  desponding  most  of  the  term.  I  hardly 
know  why,  but  it  is  sadly  so.  O  that  I  might  find 
comfort  in  Christ  !  "  We  gratefully  record  that  these 
troubles  crossed  his  path  but  rarely  at  Amenia,  where  he 
mostly  found  things  congenial  to  his  mind  and  heart. 

Concerning  Mr.  Haven's  intellectual  progress  during 
his  five  years'  residence  in  Amenia,  it  is  impossible  to 
give  a  very  adequate  account.  His  reading  appears  to 
have  been  as  diversified  as  ever,  but  his  accounts  there- 
of become  more  meager.  This  is  not  to  be  taken  as  a 
proof  that  he  read  less,  but  rather  that  he  grew  to  write 
less  about  reading  in  his  Journal ;  and  the  latter  itself 
shows  long  fits  of  interruption  in  these  years.    He  had 


92  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

the  wise  habit  of  going  more  than  once  over  books 
that  fed  his  mind.  He  deemed  Cousin,  Jeremy  Taylor, 
Shakspeare,  and  Emerson  worthy  of  such  distinction. 
He  mentions  perusing  Dickens'  Italy,"  The  Tale  of  a 
Tub,"  Stevens'  Greece  and  Russia,"  Southey's  Poems, 
Thirlwall's  "  History  of  Greece,"  Shelley,  Michelet's 
Roman  Republic,"  and  many  articles  from  the  English 
Reviews  and  the  Bibliotheca  Sacra.  Any  body  who  has 
had  much  intimacy  with  Mr.  Haven  must  have  been 
astonished  at  the  wide  range  of  his  reading  and  the  full- 
ness and  freshness  of  his  recollection  of  the  matters  it 
covered.  It  made  him  a  delightful  companion  and 
talker,  but  was  not  one  of  his  most  commendable  char- 
acteristics. 

In  the  way  of  classical  study  he  did  something 
more  than  respectable  during  the  two  years  he  was 
instructor  in  Greek  and  German.  He  taught  a  class 
in  Cicero  one  term,  read  Horace  entire,  and  remem- 
bered him  pretty  well,  while  the  rest  of  his  Latin 
grew  dim  after  a  while.  He  read  twelve  books  of  Ho- 
mer during  the  first  term,  and  all  of  him  the  first  year, 
lured  on  by  the  undecaying  charm  of  that  immortal 
verse.  While  at  work  on  this  task  he  notes  down  this 
fact  :  Had  a  curious  dream  last  night  of  conversing 
with  Homer.  He  appeared  a  bluff,  hearty,  sea-captain- 
ish  old  fellow,  wearing  no  traces  of  his  want  and  genius. 
He  talked  about  his  birthplace.  It  arose  from  reading 
Stevens'  beautiful  description  of  Scio,  and  from  reading 
the  blind  old  beggar."  One  spring  vacation  he  read  the 
last  thirty  pages  of  Plato's  Gorgias,  and  thirty  of  the 


Teacher  and  Prinxipal.  93 

tenth  book  of  the  Laws.  Here  again  he  does  not  give 
very  exact  or  full  accounts  of  his  serious  work.  He 
always  made  the  impression  of  having  retained  a  con- 
siderable acquaintance  with  Greek  to  the  end.  He 
surely  reread  the  Greek  New  Testament  and  all  Homer 
more  than  once  on  the  cars  after  he  was  made  Bishop. 

He  had  secured  considerable  more  knowledge  of  Ger- 
man than  good  students  usually  do  when  in  college. 
He  read  a  few  plays  of  Schiller's  and  some  miscel- 
laneous pieces.  At  the  seminary  he  speaks  of  doing 
his  usual  German  duties ;  but  whether  he  means  private 
reading  or  preparation  for  his  classes  is  not  clear. 
What  he  does  say  about  the  study  of  German  authors 
rather  shows  a  purpose  to  master  than  any  real  mastery. 
In  April,  1847,  says  :  Tholuck  has  a  splendid  essay 
on  the  style  of  St.  Paul,  running  somehow  thus  :  "  A 
page  of  supposed  translation  follows,  as  to  which  he 
afterward  obtained  fresh  light,  for  he  wrote  in  pencil  at 
the  bottom :  "  I  had  better  have  translated  this  into 
English,  August  24,  1848."  Yet  later  he  observes:  ''I 
have  been  trying  for  the  last  hour  or  two  to  probe  the 
thick  darkness  which  enclouds  German,  but  without  suc- 
cess." The  last  record  the  Journal  yields  on  the  topic 
is  dated  October  22,  1847: 

I  have  just  closed  Faust,  after  poring  with  strange  fascination 
over  its  subtile  and  truthful  pages.  I  find  but  little  time  to  devote 
to  it,  so  that  my  feelings  cool  down  between  the  feast  days ;  but, 
even  in  my  dim,  dull  translation,  I  cannot  fail  of  falling  under  the 
all-subduing  influence  of  Goethe's  language.  The  far-reaching 
thoughts  of  Faust,  his  clear  insight  and  expression  of  the  harrowing 


94  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

impulses  of  our  manifold  nature,  the  crafty  and  common  address  of 
the  devil  are  real,  fearfully  real. 

It  is  easy  to  see  that  rare  penetration  in  these  remarks 
with  which  Mr.  Haven  was  wont  to  touch  the  inmost 
essence  of  many  a  thing  from  which  he  was  somehow 
excluded,  as  here  by  his  ignorance  of  the  language. 
He  never  grew  at  home  in  that.  He  once  laughingly 
said  that  he  made  his  last  effort  to  speak  German  in 
Bremen  at  the  Methodist  Church  or  Mission  Institute; 
Dr.  Jacoby  asked  him  if  he  could  speak  German.  He 
responded  cheerfully,  "  O  yes,  one  small !  "  {ein  klein) 

In  the  way  of  devotional  and  theological  literature 
he  read  Mellville's  Sermons,  Upham's  Life  of  Faith," 
Southey's  "  Life  of  Wesley,"  Harris*  "  Preadamite 
Earth,"  Watson's  Institutes,"  Channing's  Works, 
Stuart  on  Channing,  and  Wesley's  Sermons.  His 
comments  are  worth  noting  for  their  unconventional 
freedom : 

Have  commenced  to-day  the  Institutes  of  Watson.  He  begins 
with  a  clear  exposition  of  the  character  of  a  moral  action  and  moral 
agent.  And  he  contends  that  natural  religion  could  neither  have 
made  known  the  law  which  moralizes  the  action  nor  have  enforced 
its  observance.  He  proves  the  weakness  or  insufficiency  of  human 
reason.  .  .  .  He  makes  out  a  strong  case.  Yet  it  seems  to  me  that 
the  pure  reason,  the  inner  sense,  the  intuitive  faculties,  do  impart 
such  knowledge  immediately.  Wesley  in  his  sermons  disappoints 
me.  He  is  too  superficial  on  great  subjects.  His  sermon  on  the 
Trinity  is  a  perfect  sham. 


It  is  pretty  plain  that  our  young- school-master  sees 
with  his  own  eyes,  and  is  not  restr^-ined  by  the  repute 


Teacher  and  Principal. 


95 


of  great  names  from  saying  what  they  do  see.  About 
this  time  he  began  to  study  the  Septuagint  with  care. 

If  we  ask  how  the  inner  hfe  of  the  soul,  rehgion  in  its 
strictest  definition,  was  flourishing  in  Mr.  Haven,  his 
papers  yield  ample  response.  It  will  be  remembered 
that  one  reason  why  he  went  to  teaching  was  that  he 
might  have  ample  time  for  preparation  for  his  profes- 
sion, and  might  maturely  consider  whether  he  was  to 
enter  the  ministry.  He  was  very  faithful  to  the  routine 
of  daily  religious  observances  all  the  time  he  was  at 
Amenia ;  he  waited  on  God  in  all  the  ordinances  of  his 
house.  The  prevailing  condition  of  his  soul  is  best  de- 
picted in  his  own  words  : 

Only  on  quiet,  dreamy  days,  when  thoughts  of  a  better  world  come 
like  a  fire  over  the  drowsy  spirit,  do  I  love  to  talk  with  myself  in  this 
Journal.  To  speak  to  these  inner  thoughts  and  ask  them  where  they 
are  traveling,  "  to  look  into  my  own  soul  and  write  "  of  its  progress 
or  regress  in  piety,  purity,  faith,  or  fear.  O  how  dark  is  the  sky  too 
generally !  brightened  by  no  sun,  no  moon,  scarcely  a  star  glimmer- 
ing through  its  gloom  profound.  But  through  this  night  of  distrust, 
of  unbelief,  of  sorrowful  regrets,  come  some  flashes  of  light.  Some- 
times joy  fills,  or  partly  fills,  the  soul,  directing  it  from  its  own  black- 
ness and  coldness  to  God,  its  light  and  life.  .  .  .  Theoretically  and 
in  sober  thought  I  feel  generally  uncondemned.  But  this  unbelief, 
this  hardness,  this  coldness  ;  O  that  the  spirit  of  Christ  might  con- 
svrme  it  utterly  !  O  that  God  may  convert  me  deeply,  wholly  !  Noth- 
ing else  will  answer,  will  satisfy.  May  I  know  the  truth  of  that  say- 
ing, "  Light  is  sown  for  the  righteous,  and  gladness  for  the  upright 
in  heart." 

There  Is  no  royal  road  to  piety,  and  so  Mr.  Haven 
quite  naturally  fell  into  that  which  the  psalmist  had 


96  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

taken  many  centuries  since :  As  the  hart  panteth  after 
the  water  brooks,  so  panteth  my  soul  after  thee,  O  God. 
My  soul  thirsteth  for  God,  for  the  living  God :  when 
shall  I  come  and  appear  before  God?"  This  private 
Journal  of  Gilbert  Haven,  meant  for  no  eye  save  his 
own  and  that  of  the  Most  Merciful,  is  in  very  many 
parts  of  it  simply  the  outpourings  of  a  soul  that  really 
panted  for  God.  Yet  this  man  was  deemed  by  many 
a  narrow,  and  by  many  a  shallow  mind,  wanting  in 
whole-hearted  piety. 

His  religious  life  in  Amenia  was  greatly  colored  by 
the  still  unsettled  question,  whether  he  should  enter  the 
ministry.  He  talked  the  matter  over  with  his  friends, 
especially  with  his  cousin  Otis  and  Mr.  W.  M.  Ingraham. 
The  case  was  the  harder  to  decide,  because  he  never 
had  a  clear  and  conscious  summons  to  the  ministry  as 
his  sole  permitted  employment.  He  thought  he  might 
glorify  God  in  law  and  statesmanship  or  in  business. 
How  could  he  do  most  for  God  and  mankind?  We 
have  already  seen  that  he  sometimes  coveted  the  field 
of  law  and  politics  as  the  best  for  him.  The  perusal  of 
his  papers  shows  a  gradually  developed  conviction  that 
duty  would  nevertheless  take  him  into  the  pulpit ;  and 
presently  this  appeared  to  him  a  far  more  solemn  and 
weighty  business  than  he  had  dreamed.  Yet  this 
change  in  his  views  did  not  enable  him  at  once  to  re- 
solve the  personal  question.  He  patiently  heard  the 
opinions  of  others  about  the  nature  of  a  vocation  to  the 
ministry,  but  could  form  none  for  himself.  In  October, 
1846,  he  writes  : 


Teacher  and  Principal. 


97 


The  Spirit  of  God  has  not  yet  moved  upon  the  waters  of  nny  soul. 
I  exclude  him  by  my  coldness  and  negligence.  I  look  onward  with 
fear  and  hope,  not  trustfully.  My  greatest  lack  is  faith ;  am  much 
disturbed  about  my  duty — delay  the  performance  of  what  may  seem 
duty.  I  have  tried  my  hand  at  writing  sermons,  but  my  heart  is  too 
black  and  distrustful.    God  give  me  grace  and  strength  ! 

Tossed  by  so  many  conflicting  hopes  and  fears,  he 
resolved  to  attempt  occasional  preaching.  His  first  ser- 
mon was  delivered  in  the  school  chapel  November  i8, 
1846.    Here  is  his  record  of  the  occasion  : 

Last  Sunday  I  read  a  sermon  in  chapel  on  the  text,  "  Light  is 
sown  for  the  righteous,  and  gladness  for  the  upright  in  heart."  Psa. 
xcvii,  II.  It  was  a  great  trial  of  spirit,  and  greatly,  I  fear,  unsuc- 
cessful. O  that  I  could  rid  myself  of  the  fear  and  love  of  man's 
opinion  !    God  give  me  grace  ! 

Yet  he  begins  now  to  dread  and  beHeve  that  it  may 
be  his  calling  to  preach  the  Gospel  with  no  clearer  voca- 
tion than  he  already  has.  Six  months  after  this  notion 
shapes  itself  thus : 

Am  I  not  moving  in  as  high,  active,  and  beneficial  a  course  as  I 
can  }  Vain  regrets  produce  nothing,  it  is  true ;  but  vain  ambition 
may  destroy,  which  is  worse.  Let  me  wage  my  battle  of  life  honor- 
ably here  ;  and  if  called,  or  if  venturing  uncalled,  into  a  more  active 
sphere,  may  God's  grace  and  innate  courage  sustain  me ! 

However,  he  was  now  fully  bent  on  testing  the  matter 

by  looking  men  in  the  face  while  he  spoke  to  them  in 

the  name  of  God.     In  December,  1846,  he  preached 

again  in  some  school-house,  and  a  letter  to  his  sister 

gives  us  a  glimpse  of  the  service  : 
5 


98 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Will  it  be  written  on  my  tombstone,  Used  up  by  not  preaching  ? 
Said  preacher  did  try  to  talk  in  a  school-house  once  this  term. 
Words  came  fast  enough,  and  appropriate  enough,  perhaps,  but  he 
was  lamentably  deficient  in  soul.  I  saw  that  he  did  not  love  to  talk, 
although  he  rattled  away  ever  so  fluently.  He  is  going  to  try  again 
next  Sunday  in  a  little  church  at  Lime  Rock,  ten  miles  away,  Hope 
he'll  feel  better ;  if  not,  I  am  afraid  he  will  back  out  of  his  calling. 

The  lightness  of  the  tone  here,  notwithstanding  the 
gravity  of  the  topic,  and  his  own  absorbing  interest  in 
the  religious  settlement  of  it,  is  a  characteristic  touch  in 
the  story.  Then  as  always  he  could  pass  from  the  most 
pathetic  and  solemn  subjects  to  lightness  and  merriment 
without  the  least  sense  of  jarring  contrast.  He  contin- 
ued to  speak  in  country  school-houses  and  churches 
whenever  a  call  reached  him ;  but  his  criticism  on  his 
own  performances  continued  jealously  severe.  The  ob- 
ject of  his  consuming  scrutiny  was  not  his  literary  quali- 
ties or  defects  in  speaking,  but  the  moral  and  spiritual 
character  of  his  work.  On  May  lo,  1848,  he  preached 
at  Pine  Plains  on  "  Pray  without  ceasing,"  and  on  the 
next  Sunday  at  Separate  on  "  The  greatest  of  these  is 
charity."    He  remarks : 

The  truth  is,  mf  soul  is  not  in  the  work.  I  do  not  love  it  as  I 
ought.  I  shrink  and  stagger  and  dread  every  time  I  speak.  I  have 
no  lack  of  words,  of  ideas,  of  easy  and  ready  expression  and  gest- 
ure ;  but  I  have  no  unction,  not  even  the  wicked  one  of  ambition. 
I  lack  the  desire,  the  strong  endeavor,  the  earnest  fullness  of  soul 
which  is  the  base,  shaft,  and  capital  of  every  pillar  of  fame  or  good- 
ness left  standing  in  the  wastes  of  time.  My  soul  is  loosened  in 
every  muscle,  paralyzed  in  every  nerve,  and  I  go  puling  and  faint- 
hearted, when  I  should  be  animated  with  energy  and  life.    O  that 


Teacher  and  Prinxipal. 


99 


*'  The  star  of  the  unconquered  will 

Might  rise  within  my  breast ! 
Serene  and  resolute  and  still ; 

And  calm  and  self-possessed." 

Still  more  do  I  pray  that  I  may  be  swallowed  up  in  God,  filled 
with  the  inspiration  and  energy  of  the  Holy  Ghost. 

"  My  feeble  mind  sustain, 

By  worldly  thoughts  oppressed, 
Appear  and  bid  me  turn  again 

To  my  eternal  rest." 

Through  all  these  embarrassments  his  eye  had  be- 
come at  last  fixed  on  the  ministry  as  his  highest  work. 
We  have  clear  evidence  of  this  in  his  seeking  a  local 
preacher's  license  of  the  Quarterly  Conference  on  June 
12,  1847: 

Went  to  Quarterly  Conference  to  get  a  license.  Felt  very  down- 
hearted and  diffident.  Was  asked  a  few  questions,  and  received.  I 
felt  it  a  ver>'  solemn  time,  and  though  dreading,  yet  desiring  the 
sacred  duties  I  had  drawn  upon  me.  O  for  grace  to  perform  them  ! 
"  God  be  merciful  to  me,  and  cause  thy  face  to  shine  upon  me  !  " 

It  would  be  needless  to  trace  out  all  the  changing 
phases  of  Mr.  Haven's  feelings  in  these  initial  stages  of 
his  ministry;  they  went  on  in  the  same  general  style 
already  noted  until  he  joined  the  New  England  Confer- 
ence, in  185 1.  Yet  it  may  be  said  in  general  terms  that 
the  drift  of  the  entries  in  the  Journal  shows  that  he  was 
gradually  coming  to  a  much  better  feeling  in  his  pulpit 
services.  Now  we  find  such  remarks  as  this :  "  Rode  to 
Bangall  and  talked  to  the  good  and  bad  people  there 
on  *  To  you  which  believe  He  is  precious.'    Had  a  pretty 


loo  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

good  time — felt  the  preciousness  of  Christ,  yet  not  as  I 
wish."  On  Sunday,  July  4,  1847,  he  opened  another 
very  important  part  of  his  work  as  a  preacher  of  right- 
eousness in  a  sermon  "  On  Christian  Politics,  comparing 
the  Passover  of  the  Israelites  with  the  Independence  of 
our  Nation."  Henceforth  the  notices  of  preaching  are 
usually  accompanied  by  the  statement  that  he  spoke 
"with  some  comfort,"  or  "with  some  freedom,"  and 
sometimes  he  had  a  "  real  good  time."  His  way  had 
gradually  cleared  up  before  him  as  he  went  on  in  duty, 
and  yet  he  had  some  temptations  to  recede  as  late  as 
1848,  when  he  accepted  the  principalship  at  Amenia. 
He  says : 

I  love  to  preach  usually,  probably  better  than  others  like  to  hear. 
Yet  I  shrink  from  taking  the  title  Rev.  Some  of  my  old  college 
mates  may  attribute  my  call  to  a  desire  to  secure  such  a  berth  as 
this,  but  nothing  could  be  farther  from  the  truth.  Nothing  but  a 
most  solemn  conscientiousness  and  unwavering  conviction  of  duty 
could  have  led  me  to  the  pulpit.  And  though  I  may  never  be  a 
preacher,  and  may,  perhaps,  go  back  to  merchandise,  I  should  do  so 
in  violation  of  what  I  often  feel  urging  me  forward. 

It  need  not  be  said  that  the  life  at  Amenia  was  not 
all  of  this  high  and  heroic  type.  The  Journal  shows 
that  in  the  main  Mr.  Haven's  life  was  as  exuberant  in 
delights  as  ever.  He  had  established  there  the  habit, 
which  clung  to  him  throughout  his  life,  of  walking 
much  in  the  open  air,  in  order  to  work  off  any  excess  of 
animal  spirits  or  strain  of  weary  nerves.  Few  men  can 
be  so  given  to  nocturnal  rambles,  or  familiar  with  all  the 
diversities  of  night-time  scenery.    He  literally  reveled 


Teacher  and  Prinxipal. 


lOI 


in  it.  The  beautiful  hills,  vales,  and  forests  of  Amenia 
constantly  invited  such  wanderings.  Then,  too,  he  had 
become  acquainted  with  a  young  lady,  whom  he  styled 
the  Rose  of  the  Sweet-scented  Valley.  His  engage- 
ment to  Miss  Mary  Ingraham  took  place  on  May  8, 
1848.  The  engagement  was  kept  secret  from  the  town, 
and  even  confidential  friends,  as  we  shall  presently  see, 
knew  of  it  only  by  vague  rumor.  One  may  fancy  that 
the  charmed  lover  could  not  well  be  very  unhappy  as  he 
stole  past  field  and  wood  to  his  charmer. 

Mr.  Haven  drew  much  delight  from  his  vacation  days 
in  these  years.  These  took  him  home  to  Maiden  as 
often  as  he  could  manage  it,  since  he  was  not  one  who 
cooled  off  in  his  old  friendships  as  he  took  up  new  ones. 
His  correspondence  with  the  home  circle  was  frequent, 
cordial,  and  interesting.  Then  he  made  use  of  these 
visits  to  hear  preachers  who  were  making  a  stir.  In 
Boston  he  heard  Bartol,  Robbins,  and  Huntingdon. 
He  also  listened  to  Dr.  Dewey,  and  was  moved  to  read 
some  of  his  sermons.  His  remarks  about  these  show 
that  his  deep  searchings  of  heart  had  given  him  a  keener 
spiritual  discernment :  Find  some  rich  passages  and 
beautiful  thoughts,  and  much  good  reasoning,  though 
marred  by  a  total  ignorance  of  that  experimental  relig- 
ion he  attempts  to  discuss." 

At  home  they  sometimes  complained  that  the  old- 
time  merry,  light-hearted  Gilbert  had  become  a  serious 
person  ;  but  they  were  rather  apt  to  have  all  the  fun 
they  wanted,  after  making  such  a  suggestion.  Here  is 
one  rather  comical  escapade: 


102 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


I  surprised  the  good  folks  by  getting  home  at  about  twelve  o'clock 
at  night,  having  been  detained  on  the  route  till  ten  o'clock,  and 
obliged  to  walk  out.  I  banged  them  up.  Father  came  to  the  win- 
dow, and,  after  some  conversation,  refused  me  a  lodging,  because  I 
would  not  give  my  name,  telling  me  to  go  to  a  tavern  or  the  poor- 
house.  He  shut  the  window  so  suddenly  that  I  could  not  reveal 
myself.  Creeping  around  I  got  into  the  back  parlor  window, 
crawled  up  stairs,  and  lay  there  till  they  came  to  the  top  for  the 
purpose  of  coming  down,  when  I  sprang  up  and  scattered  them. 
Had  a  great  laugh  over  it,  and  a  small  scolding. 

He  always  went  to  see  and  hear  Brothers  Rice  and 
Cummings,  if  possible,  for  he  then  rated  them  among 
the  ablest  men  in  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  and 
never  varied  from  this  opinion.  He  records  several 
times  the  fact  that  he  had  passed  delightful  hours  or 
evenings  chatting  with  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Rice  or  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Cummings  ;  and  once  he  spent  the  evening  with 
the  two  families  together,  and  pronounced  the  talk  very 
rich  ;  a  statement  as  probable  as  it  is  tantalizing  in  its 
vagueness.  On  one  occasion  he  chanced  on  Brother 
Rice,  and  told  him  he  was  going  to  hear  a  certain  Mr. 
Nichols  preach.  Whereupon  he  makes  the  verisimilar 
statement :  "  Brother  Rice  dissuaded  me,  and  so  I  spent 
the  time  talking  with  him."  In  the  summer  of  1848  he 
writes  :  "  Sunday  I  preached  for  Brother  Rice  in  the 
morning,  and  for  Brother  Cummings  in  the  P.  at 
Chelsea.  Had  a  moderate  time,  not  excellent.  The 
familiar  countenances  of  some  of  the  audience  some- 
what confused  me." 

Meanwhile   he   was   conscious  of  a   great  interior 


Teacher  and  Principal.  103 

change  going  on  in  his  own  character.  The  love  for  a 
free  and  careless  life  had  lost  its  hold.  He  began  to 
long  to  be  about  his  life-work.  He  suspected  that  he 
had  made  a  mistake  in  deferring  so  long  entrance  upon 
the  regular  pastoral  work  ;  for  he  professed  to  have 
learned  from  much  study  of  his  own  nature  that  he 
never  could  settle  questions  by  merely  thinking  about 
them,  while  he  always  adjusted  himself  to  the  inevitable 
and  irreparable,  and  that  more  time  for  thinking  was 
only  more  room  for  irresolution. 

His  religious  feelings  were  heightened  by  the  death 
of  several  choice  friends,  but  especially  by  the  end  of 
Mr.  George  Ingraham,  the  father  of  his  beautiful  fiancee, 
and  that  of  Miss  Emily  B.  Hunt,  and  finally  of  Mr. 
George  Ingraham,  Jr.  The  father  was  not  long  ill.  The 
elder  Ingraham  was  conscious  that  life  on  earth  was 
ending  ;  was  resigned  to  the  pleasure  of  God,  and  very 
affectionate  in  parting  with  his  companion  and  children. 
The  peace  of  his  last  hours  made  a  great. impression  on 
the  future  son-in-law.  Miss  Hunt  was  a  sister  of  the 
Rev.  Andrew  J.  Hunt,  and  of  Rev.  A.  S.  Hunt,  D.D., 
now  one  of  the  secretaries  of  the  American  Bible  Soci- 
ety. She  had  been  one  of  Mr.  Haven's  warmest  and 
most  intimate  friends  in  Amenia.  She  was  taken  ill  in 
the  autumn  of  1850,  and  died  on  the  i8th  of  the  next 
February.    The  Journal  says  : 

She  was  very  cheerful  and  playful  through  her  sickness— perfectly 
resigned  to  the  will  of  God,  perfectly  happy  in  view  of  death.  The 
last  days  were  especially  full  of  the  peace  and  joy  of  believing.  On 
Sunday  she  began  to  fail  rapidly,  and  then  her  soul  displayed  the 


104 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


beauty  of  holiness,  the  power  of  Christ.  While  awake  she  talked  in- 
cessantly of  God  and  heaven,  and  always  when  she  awoke  from 
sleep,  said  first  of  all,  "  I  am  happy  ;"  made  her  brother  sing  her  the 
most  beautiful  songs  ;  and  said  while  lying  in  his  arms, 

"  The  arms  of  faith  and  wings  of  love 
Shall  bear  me  conqueror  through." 

Tuesday  morning  she  roused  from  a  torpor,  providentially,  as  it 
seemed,  to  talk  with  Rev.  Andrew  J.  Hunt,  who  had  arrived  in  the 
night.  She  talked  freely  with  him  about  heaven  ;  was  full  of  long- 
ing desires  to  go  ;  prayed  for  patience  to  wait  the  hour  of  her  re- 
lease ;  spoke  of  seeing  many  of  her  old  associates,  among  them 
Mary  Barber  ;  took  messages  to  them  from  Andrew  ;  and,  full  of 
inexpressible  delight,  sprang  from  her  earthly  cell  to  the  light  and 
glory  of  eternal  day.    What  an  enviable  death  ! 

I  tried  to  preach  her  funeral  sermon  from  John  xvii,  24 :  "  Father. 
I  will  that  they  also,  whom  thou  hast  given  me,  be  with  m.e  where  I 
am  ;  that  they  may  behold  my  glory,  which  thou  hast  given  me  :  for 
thou  lovedst  me  before  the  foundation  of  the  world."  I  found  great 
difficulty  in  proceeding,  and  more  than  once  thought  I  should  have 
to  give  up ;  but  I  was  enabled  with  many  tears  to  finish  my  task. 
It  seemed  lil<e  preaching  the  funeral  sermon  of  a  sister  in  my  father's 
parlor. 

Six  weeks  later  another  familiar  friend,  Mr.  George 
Ingraham,  his  prospective  brother-in-law,  soared  up  out 
the  earthly  gloom  to  the  home  of  the  angels  and  of  God. 
He  had  been  well-beloved  by  all,  and  especially  an  ob- 
ject of  Mr.  Haven's  affection.  Mr.  George  Ingraham 
had  long  been  an  invalid,  so  that  his  departure  was  not 
a  surprise.    Yet  the  mourner  writes  : 

This  is  the  saddest  of  my  Amenia,  perhaps  of  my  earthly,  experi- 
ence. My  most  beloved  associate,  my  dearest  friend,  has  ascended 
to  heaven.    When  I  first  saw  him  he  was  in  the  greatest  distress. 


Teacher  and  Principal. 


105 


He  spoke  the  first  words  to  me,  "  'Most  there  !  "  I  asked,  "Can 
you  trust  Christ?"  "  Yes,"  was  his  reply.  He  has  long  been  ri- 
pening for  the  end,  and  his  virtues  shone  the  brighter  as  the  light  of 
heaven  was  thrown  more  clearly  around  them.  God  help  me  to 
emulate  his  example  ! 

This  is  the  third  heavy  loss  I  have  suffered  here  :  Mr.  Ingraham, 
George,  and  Emily.  I  have  shed  more  tears  in  Amenia  than  else- 
where. Amid  these  extraordinary  sorrows  and  joys  I  have  been  ad-\ 
vancing,  I  trust,  in  knowledge,  holiness,  practical  wisdom,  mental 
power,  spiritual  purity.  My  duties  here  have  been  benehcial.  My 
studies  have  enlarged  my  knowledge ;  reflection,  my  ideas.  Prayer 
and  meditation  have  drawn  me  nearer  to  Christ.  I  go  forth  in  the 
name  of  my  Saviour.  Heaven  is  all  that  is  valuable.  Christ  is  all 
that  is  supremely  lovely.  I  feel  that  I  am  willing  to  be  any  thing  or 
nothing,  so  that  I  may  win  Christ.  My  profession  sometimes  seems 
dark,  but  beyond  I  see  light.  O  how  I  thank  God  for  his  goodness 
to  me — for  his  preventing  and  pardoning  grace !  How  great  a  sin- 
ner I  am  !  How  great  a  Saviour  he  is  !  May  I  be  humble,  faithful, 
holy,  happy,  now  and  forever.  May  I  ever  live  in  Christ,  and  may  I 
hear  at  the  close  of  my  career  the  voice  of  Christ  saying : 

"Servant  of  God,  well  done  !  " 

Where  I  shall  begin  my  new  duties  I  know  not.  I  shall  postpone 
writing  here  until  I  am  ushered  into  my  new  office  and  assume  my 
new  responsibility. 

These  words  were  written  March  30,  185 1,  the  last 

evening  that  he  spent  in  Amenia.    The  next  day  he 

started  for  home,  with  the  purpose  of  joining  the  New 

England  Conference  at  its  session,  opening  on  April  23, 

at  Newburyport,  Mass. 
5* 


io6 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  VI. 


NORTHAMPTON. 


Jobs  Conference— Stationed  at  Northampton— Reads  Edwards— The  Place  and  his 
Work — Salary— Becomes  one  of  the  School  Committee— A  Debt  Paid— Value  of  this  Ex- 
perience—Letter to  Rev.  A.  Gould— Marriage— Love  and  Courtship— The  Wedding 
Journey — The  Northampton  Paradise— Mrs.  Haven— Letters. 


EV.  GILBERT  HAVEN  was  admitted  to  the  New 


England  Conference  on  trial  the  last  week  in  April, 
1 85 1.  When  the  session  was  concluded  he  found  him- 
self stationed  at  Northampton,  Mass.  He  opened  his 
pastorate  there  the  first  Sunday  in  May,  full  of  youth- 
ful hopes.  His  first  impressions  of  the  new  home  and 
his  plans  for  labor  there  are  given  a  fortnight  after  his 
arrival : 

I  have  been  here  two  weeks  last  Saturday,  but  hardly  felt  settled 
until  to-day.  I  have  just  tinished  arranging  my  books,  and  their  old 
familiar  faces  are  very  agreeable  companions.  They  are  the  only 
connecting  link  I  have  with  the  past,  and  no  slight  tie  are  they.  I 
have  a  pleasant  room,  the  front  parlor  of  the  house  of  Mr.  Osborn, 
on  Pleasant  Street,  well  furnished  and  situated.  My  church  is  a 
comfortable,  pleasant  edifice;  membership  good  and  active,  but  poor 
in  wealth  and  numbers ;  the  congregation  fair,  and  will,  I  hope,  in- 
crease. Here  I  am  for  a  year  at  least,  and  I  expect  it  will  be  a 
pleasant  year.  The  place  is  beautiful  in  every  respect,  and  will  be 
a  glorious  place  to  wander  through.  I  have  designs  to  enter  some- 
what largely  upon  my  studies,  but  may  be  interrupted.  I  have  en- 
joyed much  religion  since  I  came  here.  Have  felt  Christ  ver}'  pre- 
cious at  times. 


Northampton. 


107 


We  may  take  the  record  of  one  day  as  an  example  of 
the  manner  in  which  he  spent  many: 

I  have  begun  Plato  in  the  original,  read  five  pages,  find  it  easy  and 
interesting.  Also  commenced  Bush's  "  Commentary  on  Genesis." 
This,  with  Alexander  on  the  Psalms,  which  I  am  now  reading,  with 
the  Septuagint  and  Bloomfield,  will  occupy  my  leisure.  Made  three 
pastoral  calls  to-day.  Do  not  yet  feel  quite  at  home  in  this  duty, 
but  hope,  by  God's  grace,  to  be  faithful  in  it. 

Living  in  the  magnificent  old  town  which  Jonathan 
Edwards  had  once  hoped  to  turn  into  a  sort  of  suburb 
of  the  New  Jerusalem,  to  the  great  discomfort  of  his 
parishioners  and  his  own  sore  disappointment,  the 
young  minister  naturally  read  and  studied  the  writings 
of  that  heroic  thinker  with  much  care.    He  remarks  : 

I  have  read  Edwards  on  the  Affections,  and  admire  his  thought 
and  spirit.  What  a  holy  man  !  I  have  tried  to  apply  his  tests  of 
true  Christianity  to  myself,  with  satisfaction  as  to  their  existence,  but 
with  much  shame  and  sorrow  at  their  feebleness  and  indistinctness. 

0  may  I  be  filled  with  the  spirit  of  humility,  love,  and  holiness! 

1  think  he  lays  too  much  stress  on  the  continual  recognition  of  un- 
godliness in  the  heart.  Not  too  much  for  myself  or  ordinary  Chris- 
tians ;  but  I  am  inclined  to  believe  in  a  conscious  cleansing  of  the 
heart  from  its  foulness  by  the  power  of  Christ.  I  do  not  feel  clear 
upon  the  point  as  yet ;  if  I  did,  I  should  not  rest  until  I  had  entered 
that  state.  His  delineations  of  spiritual  pride  and  mock  humility  are 
very  clear  and  close.  I  feel  my  spiritual  state  improved  by  the  study 
ot  his  works. 

The  membership  of  the  Northampton  Church  was 
less  than  seventy,  so  that  his  social  position  was  infe- 
rior to  that  he  enjoyed  at  Amenia.    The  soil  was  not 


TOS 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


deemed  favorable  to  Methodism,  and  a  faint-hearted 
man  might  have  felt  that  his  position  required  success 
under  conditions  which  hardly  permitted  it.  But  not  a 
trace  of  such  a  feeling  appears  in  the  Journal  and  letters 
of  Gilbert  Haven.  Yet  while  he  uniformly  ignores  the 
unpleasant  features  of  his  appointment,  he  insists  regu- 
larly upon  its  brighter  aspects.  His  salary  was  small, 
and  somev/hat  irregularly  paid,  and  part  of  that  was  a 
domestic  missionary  appropriation.  He  was  not  the 
man  to  complain  to  parishioners  more  frugal  and  self 
denying  than  himself.  He  used  to  say  that  the  Church 
was  ''the  bride,  the  Lamb's  wife;"  and  insisted  that 
ministers  should  bear  themselves  toward  her  with  the 
most  honorable  and  delicate  respect.  And  nothing  so 
sharply  aroused  his  suspicions  concerning  the  entire  de- 
votion of  clergymen  to  their  calling  as  any  selfish  or  in- 
decorous conduct  toward  any  church,  however  lowly. 
Nor  were  these  extravagant  ideas,  taken  up  at  a  period 
when  he  would  have  no  opportunity  to  exemplify  his 
own  teachings.  His  way  of  thinking  and  speaking  on 
this  subject  may  be  seen  in  a  letter  written  about  this 
time  to  Mr.  Alexander  Winchell,  the  eminent  geologist: 

What  little  experience  I  have  had  in  my  profession  has  been  of  a 
very  pleasant  nature,  and  I  fancy  that  I  shall  find  the  path  far  more 
abundantly  strown  with  roses  than  with  thorns.  Though  I  am  not 
so  foolish  as  to  expect  constant  sunshine  here,  I  hope  I  shall  be  wise 
enough  to  see  the  beauties  in  the  clouds  and  darkness,  and  to  co  op- 
erate with  them  in  the  production  of  their  designed  effect,  to  loosen 
the  bonds  of  earth  and  strengthen  those  of  heaven.  I  have  a  beauti- 
ful spot,  the  finest  village  in  Massachusetts,  full  of  wealth  and  taste, 
and  the  finest  of  natural  scenery. 


Northampton. 


One  incident,  which  reveals  this  sentiment  in  the 
poorest  charge  he  ever  had,  was  first  told  after  his  death 
by  a  member  of  the  official  board  at  Northampton. 
Conversing  with  one  of  his  members,  he  said  : 

We  were  speaking  of  salaries  at  our  last  ministers'  meeting.  The 
brethren  were  telling  how  much,  or  rather  how  little,  they  had  re- 
ceived for  their  year's  work  thus  far,  but  they  did  not  get  any  such 
information  out  of  me. 

Just  what  he  did  receive  the  minutes  of  the  next  Con- 
ference would  show.  The  sum  was  so  small  that  he  was 
at  a  loss  whether  he  ought  to  come  back  the  second 
year  to  exist  on  such  a  pittance,  though  the  entire 
Church  greatly  desired  his  return.  What  added  to  his 
perplexity  was  his  opinion  that  the  congregation  ought 
to  take  full  care  of  him  as  its  minister,  and  refuse  the 
domestic  missionary  appropriation  made  to  them.  The 
relief  of  this  perplexity  came  about  in  a  way  very  hon- 
orable to  himself.  He  writes  about  this  episode  to  his 
father  thus : 

They  elected  me  unanimously  to  the  very  dignified  office  of  school 
committee,  as  I  happened  to  be  on  both  tickets.  And  the  school 
committee,  with  equal  unanimity,  I  presume,  in  consequence  of  the 
example  set  them  by  the  town,  appointed  me  superintendent  of  the 
district  schools,  and  associate  superintendent  of  the  high  schools. 
These  offices  will  require  some  attention,  as  the  general  oversight  of 
all  the  schools  is  deputed  to  me  ;  but  they  will  bring  in  over  $200 
salary,  a  very  respectable  addition  to  the  mite  that  I  received  before. 
The  principal  advantage  is  that  it  gives  our  society  a  little  more 
prominence  in  the  place7  and  helps  to  do  away  with  the  most  absurd 
prejudices  against  us,  such  as  probably  flourished  in  Maiden  when 
you  first  joined  our  Church.    One  thing  which  assisted  in  this  work 


I  lO 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


was  an  invitation  to  give  the  Friday  evening  lecture  before  the  First 
Church,  which  I  gave  awhile  ago,  an  event  as  wonderful  as  it  would 
have  been  forty  years  ago  for  a  Methodist  preacher  to  have  been  in- 
vited to  conduct  the  services  at  the  Old  South.  Fast  Day  I  preached 
in  the  old  church  a  sermon,  half-way  antislavery  in  language,  and 
wholly  so  in  tendency,  to  the  great  joy  of  the  AboHtionists,  and  the 
great  rage  of  the  Websterian  portion  of  the  audience. 

About  this  period  an  obligation  of  the  trustees, 
amounting  to  several  hundred  dollars,  became  due. 
They  were  not  able  to  meet  it,  and  tried  to  procure  an 
extension  of  credit.  The  holder  of  the  note  said  he 
must  have  the  money,  perhaps  a  little  roughly.  Mr. 
Haven's  business  tact  at  once  came  into  play.  He  called 
on  the  creditor,  and  saw  at  a  glance  that  the  man  meant 
to  have  his  money,  not  because  he  needed  it,  but  be- 
cause he  had  lost  faith  in  the  trustees.  The  pastor  pro- 
posed one  arrangement  and  then  another,  only  to  have 
them  rejected.  At  last  he  looked  the  creditor  coolly  in 
the  eyes  and  said,  I  will  assume  the  responsibility  for 
that  money,  and  see  that  it  is  paid  over  soon."  The 
man  of  business  responded,  "  I  will  accept  your  pledge, 
and  you  can  have  as  much  time  for  getting  the  funds  as 
you  think  reasonable." 

Mr.  Haven  did  not  in  the  least  know  where  the 
money  was  to  be  had,  but  set  about  the  task  he  had 
drawn  upon  himself  with  his  wonted  cheerfulness  and 
skill.  The  General  Conference  was  held,  in  1852,  at 
Bromfield  Street,  in  Boston.  He  went  home  to  Maiden 
and  picked  up  such  sums  as  he  could  from  laymen 
whom  he  encountered  there  and  at  the  General  Con- 


NORTHAMPTOX. 


ference.  He  pushed  the  business  elsewhere  also  with 
such  keenness  that  he  presently  wrote  home  him  to  his 
father  : 

You  know  probably  that  I  have  been  to  New  York  on  a  similar 
errand  to  that  which  brought  me  to  Boston  last  spring,  a  mixture  of 
love  and  business,  a  sort  of  bitter-sweet  draught  daily  swallowed. 
We  stayed  there  about  a  fortnight,  though  we  were  absent  from 
home  about  four  weeks,  visiting  William  Rice's,  Middletown,  and 
New  Haven,  en  route.  I  picked  their  pockets  of  about  $250,  and 
gave  them  their  money's  worth  in  sermons. 

The  experience  he  gained  from  this  piece  of  business 
was  very  useful  to  him  afterward.  In  due  time  he  be- 
came a  very  successful  and  diligent  pleader  for  all  sorts 
of  good  works  with  the  readiest  kind  of  answers  for  the 
consenting  or  parrying  responses  he  called  out.  It  is 
said  that  a  wealthy  merchant,  to  whom  he  had  applied 
in  aid  of  one  of  his  enterprises,  gave  him  some  eagles  at 
a  time  when  gold  was  at  a  high  premium.  He  took  the 
money  with  a  pleased  look,  thanked  the  donor  with 
grateful  courtesy,  and  added,  I  hope  your  prayers  will 
follow  your  gift."  "  Prayers  I  "  said  the  other,  prayers  ! 
No,  I  am  not  good  at  prayers ;  I  would  rather  give  you 
more  eagles.  Take  your  pick  between  more  eagles  and 
as  many  prayers."  Mr.  Haven  took  the  eagles ;  where- 
upon the  giver  said,  So  you  think  the  eagles  better 
than  my  prayers,  do  you  ?  "  Said  Haven,  The  eagles 
are  above  par,  but  reluctant  prayers  are  always  at  a 
heavy  discount."  He  was  once  heard  to  say  to  a  Meth- 
odist millionaire,  who  complained  that  he  always  went 
armed  with  subscription  books,  "  Yes,  Brother  Snow, 


112 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


we  are  like  doctors  who  let  blood  to  save  life.  That's 
the  only  hope  sometimes." 

This  business  also  suggested  the  formation  of  the 
New  England  Conference  Church  Aid  Society,  of  which 
he  was  a  leading  originator. 

While  at  Northampton  he  exchanged  in  the  region 
all  around,  and  his  facile  pen  touched  off  the  most  strik- 
ing accounts  of  places  and  men.  Here  is  one  about  a 
ride  from  Greenfield  to  Shelburne  Falls  on  an  exchange 
with  Rev.  William  Butler,  afterward  the  famous  mission- 
ary :  We  had  a  splendid  ride  up  a  high  mountain, 
through  a  gorge  formed  by  a  torrent,  which  gives  rich 
mountain  and  forest  views ;  and  then  in  a  moment  opens 
up  a  vast  area,  around  which  stand  hills  innumerable, 
into  which  the  road  runs,  ending  in  a  delicious  little  vil- 
lage cuddling  around  a  waterfall." 

Of  course,  the  memories  of  this  earliest  of  his  pastoral 
charges  were  sweet  beyond  description  to  Mr.  Haven  in 
his  later  years.  Here  is  his  reply  to  an  invitation  to  at- 
tend a  memorial  service  at  Northampton,  written  as  he 
was  unconsciously  drawing  near  to  welcome  release  from 
all  earthly  cares  and  burdens  : 

New  York,  Nov.  21,  1877. 

Rev.  Albert  Gould  : 

Dear  Brother— I  should  have  been  glad  to  have  given  you 
reminiscences  of  my  pastorate  at  Northampton  had  not  sickness  and 
the  imperative  orders  of  physicians  prevented.  As  your  invitation 
lay  before  me,  visions  of  that  first  ministerial  experience  came  up 
before  me.  The  little  cluster  of  happy  souls  gathered  in  that  vestry 
of  a  Sabbath,  and  especially  of  a  week-day  night  ;  the  small,  though 
larger  congregation,  in  the  church  ;  the  songs  and  testimonies  and 


Northampton.  113 

ardent  prayers ;  the  simple  faith,  strong  and  clear,  of  the  elect  few 
that  in  poverty  and  social  contumely,  laid  the  foundation  of  our 
church  ;  these  are  not  forgotten  in  my  recollections,  and  come  up 
yet,  I  believe,  in  remembrance  before  God. 

I  vividly  recall  a  prayer-meeting  on  a  very  stormy  night,  when  only 
six  were  present.  Such  power  I  do  not  remember  to  have  seen  and 
felt  in  any  other  prayer-meeting  in  my  entire  pastorate. 

"  God  came  down  our  souls  to  great, 
And  glory  crowned  the  mercy-seat." 

It  seemed  as  if  tongues  like  as  of  fire  sat  on  each  of  that  little  as- 
sembly. We  had  troubles,  sore  and  thick,  in  those  days.  Troubles 
with  creditors  especially ;  troubles  among  the  brethren,  not  so  pecul- 
iar ;  but  out  of  them  all  the  Lord  delivered  us.    I  trust  he  still  delivers. 

I  remember  one  incident  in  connection  with  a  choir  difficulty  that  / 
illustrates  the  influence  which  Jonathan  Edwards  still  has  in  that 
town,  though  dead  for  more  than  a  century.  While  we  were  debat- 
ing how  to  reconcile  their  feuds,  a  young  brother,  a  broom-maker, 
(I  have  forgotten  his  name,)  usually  our  most  silent  member,  spoke 
and  said,  "  I  think  I  have  discovered  the  origin  of  evil.  Lucifer  was 
leader  of  the  choir  in  heaven.  Of  course,  riot  broke  out,  and  the  fall 
came  naturally  about."  Dr.  Theodore  Cuyler  this  summer  declared 
that  this  was  the  brightest  saying  he  had  ever  heard.  It  came  from 
the  old  Edwards'  seed. 

So  did  the  spiritual  life  and  power  of  that  little  company.  They, 
too,  were  heirs  of  that  faith  and  zeal  which  characterized  the  good 
men  of  Northampton.  W^ith  a  less  fatalistic  creed,  they  had  greater 
Christian  love  and  power.  May  their  successors  still  more  abound 
in  those  graces  ! 

The  beauty  of  that  grand  old  town,  the  most  beautiful  of  all 
American  towns,  which  are  the  most  beautiful  towns  in  the  world, 
like  Wordsworth's  "  Tintern  Abbey,"  passes  into  the  "  purer  mind 
with  tranquil  restoration."    It  will  never  leave  my  memory. 

I  hope  your  success  and  that  of  your  followers,  and  of  the  Church, 
will  be  greater  than  that  of  all  your  forerunners.    It  will  afford  me 


114  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


joy  always  to  hear  that  this  church  of  my  first  ministry  walks  in  the 
truth,  and  flourishes  in  the  faith  of  the  Gospel. 

Ever  faithfully  yours,  G.  Haven. 

On  September  17,  185 1,  Gilbert  Haven  was  married 
at  Amenia,  N.  Y.,  to  Miss  Mary  Ingraham.*  The  new- 
ly married  pair  took  a  short  wedding  trip  through 
Northern  New  York  and  Vermont,  and  were  soon  set- 
tled down  to  begin  their  married  life  in  Northampton. 
The  first  note  of  the  event  itself,  recorded  in  the  Journal 
under  date  of  October  12,  of  the  same  year,  says  :  As 
it  was  but  the  open  avowal  and  life-long  confession  and 
expression  of  a  state  long  ago  spiritually  consummated, 
my  feelings  underwent  no  change  comparable  with  that 
passed  through  almost  four  years  since,  as  hinted  in  a 
previous  part  of  this  Journal." 

*  The  parents  of  Mary  Ingraham  Haven  were : 

George  Ingraham,  born  in  Bristol,  R.  I.,  October  8,  1793,  died  in  Ame- 
nia September  24,  1849. 

Mary  Michelle,  born  in  New  York  city,  March  11,  179S,  died  in  Amenia, 
February  18,  1858. 

They  were  married  in  Amenia,  November  16,  1816.  Their  children 
were  : 

Samuel  Ingraham,  born  March  25,  18 18. 

Infant  son,  born  September  8,  18 19  ;  died  the  next  day. 

Timothy  Murphy  Ingraham,  born  January  12,  1821. 

Richard  Ingraham,  bom  July  8,  1S23. 

William  Murphy  Ingraham,  born  February  2.  1827. 

George  Ingraham,  born  September  30,  1829  ;  died  March  26,  185T. 

Mary  Ingraham,  born  October  2,  1831  ;  died  April  3,  i860. 

Sally  Ann  Ingraham,  born  November  2,  1833. 

Henry  C.  Murphy  Ingraham,  born  May  2,  1838. 

Jane  Augusta  Ingraham,  born  January  13,  1843. 


Northampton.  115 

Obeying  the  suggestion  of  a  reference  to  the  previous 
pages  of  the  Journal,  we  are  struck  with  the  fact  that, 
down  to  a  certain  date,  that  document  shows  almost  no 
trace  of  any  thing  Hke  special  interest  in  ladies.  The 
Journal  and  letters  in  our  hands  from  1839  onward  to 
1847  show  no  tokens  of  any  thing  like  love  for  any  lady 
on  Mr.  Haven's  part.  He  frequently  speaks  of  meeting 
ladies  here  and  there,  notes  their  appearance  and  man- 
ners, and  gives  accounts  of  their  accomplishments  and 
conversation.  He  sometimes  sends  messages  to  par- 
ticular ladies,  or  responds  gayly  to  messages  which  had 
come  to  him  ;  and  some  of  his  letters  to  young  ladies, 
dating  back  to  his  early  manhood,  may  still  be  read. 
But  these  topics  are  described  with  as  much  interest  as 
he  shows  in  narrating  his  general  adventures  or  describ- 
ing so  many  gentlemen.  The  last  statement  is  not 
quite  true,  since  he  shows  no  such  interest  in  or  admira- 
tion for  any  ladies  as  he  expresses  for  William  Rice  and 
Fales  Henry  Newhall,  for  W.  M.  Ingraham  and  E.  O. 
Haven.  The  first  intimation  of  some  change  of  this  nat- 
ure may  perhaps  be  found  foreshadowed  in  a  sentence 
or  two,  under  date  of  March  19,  1848:  "  The  last  three 
weeks  have  been  too  full  of  feeling  to  need  commemora- 
tion in  order  to  recollect  ;  the  two  before  the  last  the 
happiest,  the  last  the  saddest  of  my  life."  His  letters 
at  this  period  show  that  no  change  m  his  previous  cir- 
cumstances had  arisen  to  account  for  such  a  prodigious 
and  sudden  transition  from  extreme  joy  to  utter  misery; 
so  that  we  must  needs  conclude  that  some  dearly  be- 
loved creature  had  smiled  or  seemed  to  smile  upon 


ii6 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


him,  and  then  frowned  or  seemed  to  frown.  This  ap. 
pears  more  probable,  because  on  the  same  page  stands 
a  quotation  from  Queen  Mab,  such  as  would  be  likely 
to  arrest  the  attention  of  a  lover,  the  first  of  the  kind  in 
the  Journal : 

"  Joy  to  the  Spirit  came, 
Such  joy  as  when  a  lover  sees 
The  chosen  of  his  soul  in  happiness, 
And  witnesses  her  peace 
Whose  woe  to  him  were  bitterer  than  death  ; 
Sees  her  unfaded  cheek 
Glow  mantling  in  first  luxury  of  health, 
'  Thrills  with  her  lovely  eyes, 

Which,  like  two  stars  amid  the  heaving  main, 
Sparkle  through  liquid  bliss," 

Perhaps  he  would  have  gone  on  in  this  style  of  alter- 
nating happiness  and  despair  for  many  months  if  the 
trustees  of  the  seminary  had  not  decided  early  in  May 
to  offer  him  the  principalship ;  awd  he  would  not  decide 
what  to  do  about  that  until  he  had  got  a  certain  pre- 
vious question  settled.  Unless  Mary  Ingraham  should 
look  benignly  upon  him,  the  sooner  he  could  turn  his 
back  on  Amenia  and  all  it  contained  the  better  for  him. 
To  be  sure,  he  does  not  name  her  as  yet  in  the  lightest 
whisper,  but  says  May  9,  1848: 

This  has  been  rather  an  eventful  day  for  me.  Last  night  I  spent 
two  hours  in  very  earnest  and  solemn  conversation  on  a  subject 
which  vitally  concerns  my  temporal  welfare  and  happiness,  if  not  my 
eternal. 

What  came  of  the  conversation  he  does  not  even 
hint,  but  we  may  conjecture  something  from  the  fact 


Northampton. 


117 


that  he  took  the  principalship.  About  six  weeks  after- 
ward comes  a  passage  which  all  who  would  know  Gil- 
bert Haven  should  read  with  care : 

r  never  want  my  life  disunited,  to  feel  a  great  gulf  fixed  between 
the  present  and  the  past.  I  don't  think  it  is  so.  I  feel  as  gleeful  at 
times  as  I  ever  did.  I  hope  to  enjoy  these  olden  memories  and  link 
them  with  kindred  feelings  in  the  present.    As  Wordsworth  says : 

"  My  heart  leaps  up  when  I  behold 

A  rainbow  in  the  sky. 

So  was  it  when  my  life  began, 

So  is  it  now  I  am  a  man, 

So  let  it  be  when  I  am  old, 

Or  let  me  die. 

The  child  is  father  of  the  man, 
And  I  could  wish  my  days  might  be 
Joined  each  to  each  in  natural  piety." 

Anna  says  I  am  soberer  this  term  than  she  has  ever  seen  me  be- 
fore. The  thoughts  of  coming  duties  creep  over  my  shrinking  soul 
and  sober  my  flighty  fancies.  ...  I  have  been  greatly  changed  the 
past  three  months  in  my  thoughts  and  feelings.  I  know  there  has 
been  almost  a  new  creation  within  my  soul ;  yes,  really  a  new  crea- 
tion. I  don't  feel  like  expressing  the  thoughts  that  burn  so  con- 
stantly within  me.  ...  I  don't  fear  that  I  shall  ever  forget  them, 
neither  in  this  world  nor  any  other ;  and  I  don't  desire  to.  What 
sources  of  exquisite,  of  maddening  bliss  and  misery  they  have  been 
to  me !  Strange,  very  strange  it  is  that  so  powerful  an  element  in 
my  soul  lay  supine  so  long,  so  fathomless  and  boundless  a  sea  lay 
hidden  from  my  consciousness,  so  vast  and  rich  a  continent  remained 
undiscovered  there  !  And  perhaps  the  awakener  of  that  power,  the 
first  navigator  and  sounder  of  those  hitherto  sunless  and  trackless 
depths,  the  discoverer  of  that  new  world,  may  have  been  unaware  at 
the  time,  though  not  now,  of  her  own  agency  in  this  business.  I 
know  my  feelings  have  been  remarkably  purified,  my  views  exalted, 


Ii8 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


my  thoughts  expanded,  my  passions  strengthened  and  concentrated, 
not  ignobly,  no,  the  farthest,  the  very  farthest  from  that.  I  know 
too  that,  as  the  Bible  seemed  a  new  book  when  I  opened  it  after  my 
conversion,  as  I  was  surprised  at  the  fitness  of  its  expressions  for  my 
novel  state,  and  at  the  exact  portraiture  of  every  feeling,  the  exact 
supply  for  every  necessity  which  my  new  state  exhibited  and  de- 
manded, so  much  that  was  hitherto  untranslatable,  which  awoke  no 
response  in  me,  and  was  enjoyed  for  minor  graces  only,  and  not  for 
what  it  was  designed  to  express,  has  appeared  in  a  new  light,  the 
light  in  which  it  was  created  and  designed  to  shine. 

What  if  there  should  be  other  faculties  or  resources  in  our  soul 
which  may  never  be  revealed  here  ?  How  do  we  know  but  the  fall 
of  Adam  buried  some  nascent  power  so  deeply  that  it  can  never 
spring  up  in  our  earthly  house  ?  How  do  we  know  but  that  this 
garb  of  flesh  has  concealed  certain  faculties  of  the  soul  so  com- 
pletely that  they  cannot  be  brought  to  view  in  our  mortal  state  ? 
How  do  we  know  but  the  little  principles  and  functions  we  perceive 
and  nurture  may  be  as  plants  and  animals  w'hich,  in  their  early 
stages,  have  a  form  and  an  apparent  nature  very  dif¥erent  from  what 
they  afterward  assume  ?  So  may  these  shoot  out  in  another  world 
into  something  so  different  from  what  characterized  them  here  that 
they  shall  seem  of  an  opposite  nature,  and  so  lead  on  to  sublimer 
knowledge  and  feelings. 

For  some  unstated  reason  it  was  deemed  best  to 
keep  the  engagement  a  close  secret.  Remembering 
that  Amenia  Seminary  was  attended  by  young  people 
of  either  sex,  it  becomes  probable  that  one  reason  for 
this  course  was  that  the  new  principal  would  be  better 
able  to  govern  the  school  in  some  points  through  such 
silence.  Then  he  would  hinder  a  great  deal  of  needless 
chatter  and  gossip  among  the  students  themselves 
through  this  precaution.  But  close  as  the  lovers  strove 
to  keep  their  fond  mystery,  some  whispered  suspicion 


Northampton.  119 

stole  around  a  circle  of  intimate  acquaintances.  Mrs. 
E.  O.  Haven  goes  to  Amenia,  hears  the  current  conject- 
ures, and  turns  home  to  convey  her  own  uncertainties  to 
her  husband  as  the  only  possible  tidings.  It  is  proba- 
ble also  that  she  was  followed  home  by  a  letter  from 
Gilbert  in  reply  to  one  making  certain  natural  queries. 
Under  these  conditions  one  passage  in  Gilbert's  letter  is 
deliciously  adroit : 

You  ask  if  my  heart  is  whole  ?  I  can  assure  you  that  it  is.  Prob- 
ably you  will  have  been  assured  before  you  get  this  that  it  is  wholly 
given  up  to  idolatry,  though  my  worship  and  sacrifice  at  the  idola- 
trous shrine  are  not  as  clear  as  some  could  desire  to  confirm  their 
suspicions  of  my  state.  You  may  place  the  most  implicit  confidence 
in  the  news  you  will  heaj:  before  bed-time,  for  you  never  could  dis- 
trust one  so  deserving. 

These  rumors  travel  homeward  to  his  sister  Anna 
from  her  Amenia  correspondents,  and  similar  conject- 
ures probably  reach  Mrs.  Rev.  Joseph  Cummings,  a  for- 
mer resident  at  the  seminary,  to  strengthen  the  others. 
In  one  of  his  letters  to  Anna,  Gilbert  refers  to  these 
rumors  jocosely,  and  finally  gives  her  news  of  the  young 
lady  in  this  way : 

I  suppose  I  mustn't  omit  Mary  Ingraham,  because  all  of  'em 
would  say  it  was  because  I  dare  not  talk  of  her.  I  should,  of  course, 
be  very  happy  to  talk  of  or  to  her,  but  as  the  latter  hasn't  been  al- 
lowed me  yet,  I  can't  indulge  myself  greatly  in  the  first.  I  have  only 
had  half  a  glimpse  at  her,  and  perhaps  half  a  word  with  her.  The 
glimpse  disclosed  her  usual  healthy  (don't  you  want  me  to  say  hand- 
some ?)  appearance.  The  half  word  was  fractionized  into  inquiries 
about  you,  descriptions  of  herself,  and  I  don't  know  what  else. 


120 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


More  than  a  year  later  he  wishes  to  say  something 
about  his  idol,  and  mixes  the  news  for  his  sister  in  this 
nonchalant  way  : 

As  to  your  friends  :  Lib.  and  Jule  are  comfortable  when  not  be- 
side too  hot  a  fire.  Emily  Miles  is  as  poetic  as  ever,  studies  herself 
to  death,  to  the  great  vexation  of  her  easily  vexed  chum,  Sarah  In- 
graham.  The  latter  is  as  rosy  and  as  jolly  and  as  fiery  as  ever. 
Her  sister  (isn't  this  a  quiet  way  of  coming  at  it)  is  as  full  of  health 
and  spirits— not  blue,  but  of  the  brightest  sort — as  the  Elysian  Fields. 

Of  course,  times  would  come  when  something  very 
near  like  a  revelation  of  his  condition  leaped  from  his 
pen.  One  of  his  sisters,  now  dead,  had  an  offer  of  mar- 
riage, concerning  which  she  sought  advice  at  home,  and 
finally  declined.    Writing  to  her,  Gilbert  says  : 

Your  very  course  was  enough  to  convince  me  that  you  ought  not 
to  marry.  When  you  asked  advice  on  such  a  subject  it  showed  a 
want  of  the  love  which  overleaps  all  advice,  never  thinks  of  asking 
hardly  its  own  heart,  and  much  less  thinks  of  confiding  such  queries 
to  others'  cold  opinions.  No,  no !  Unless  your  heart  leaped  for  joy 
at  sight  of  him,  unless  your  thoughts  dwelt  in  tenderness  constantly 
upon  him,  unless  your  dreams  delighted  to  keep  him  before  you,  it 
was  no  use  to  attempt  to  throw  off  old-maidship  at  the  expense  of 
every  joy,  and  with  the  sure  expectancy  of  coldness  and  dislike.  As 
Miss  Barrett,  who  remained  single  until  over  forty,  and  has  just  mar- 
ried a  poet,  Browning  by  name,  says  of  a  woman's  love,  so  say  I  of 
both  man's  and  woman's.  You  will  have  to  read  it  carefully  and 
several  times  to  get  its  full  force  and  beauty : 

"  Go,  lady,  lean  to  the  night  guitar, 
And  drop  a  smile  to  the  bringer  ; 
Then  smile  as  sweetly  when  he  is  far, 
,      At  the  voice  of  an  in-doo*"  singer  ; 


Northampton. 


121 


Bask  tenderly  beneath  tender  eyes,  , 

Glance  lightly  on  their  removing ; 
And  join  new  vows  to  old  perjuries. 

But  dare  not  call  it  loving  ! 
Unless  you  can  muse  in  a  crowd  all  day 

On  the  absent  face  that  fixed  you  ; 
Unless  you  can  love  as  angels  may, 

With  the  breadth  of  heaven  betwixt  you ; 
Unless  you  can  think  when  the  song  is  done 

No  other  is  soft  in  the  rhythm  ; 
Unless  you  can  feel  when  left  by  one 

That  all  men  beside  go  with  him ; 
Unless  you  can  know  when  unpraised  by  his  breath 

That  your  beauty  itself  wants  proving  ; 
Unless  you  can  swear — For  life — For  death  ! 

O  fear  to  call  it  loving  ! 
Unless  you  can  dream  that  his  faith  is  fast 

Through  behoving  and  unbehoving  ; 
Unless  you  can  die  when  the  dream  is  past, 

O  never  call  it  loving." 

Perhaps  you  will  think  I  am  in  love  myself.  I  write  and  quote  so 
passionately.  Well,  when  I  am,  it  will  be  as  I  write  and  quote  ;  and 
you  will  never  hear  of  it  from  me.  I  am  going  to  write  to  Lydia 
all  about  it  in  a  day  or  two,  and  refer  you  for  particulars  to  her 
letter. 

Of  course,  Lydia  never  got  the  promised  letter,  and 
the  bright  home  circle  knew  at  once  that  he  had  man- 
aged to  let  them  read  between  the  lines  all  that  he  in- 
tended them  to  know — his  engagement  without  consult- 
ing  them,  and  his  deliberate  silence  about  it.  More 
information  on  the  subject  they  were  unable  to  gain. 
What  people  might  dream  about  them  was  perfectly 

indifferent  to  this  pair  of  fond  lovers,  who  walked  the 
6 


122 


LiF^E  OF  Gilbert  Haven. 


happy  earth  tranced  in  quite  unspeakable  rapture.  The 
time  so  long  waited  and  ardently  longed  for  came  at 
last,  and  the  expectant  bridegroom  sent  the  family  at 
Maiden  an  invitation  to  be  present  at  the  ceremony 
couched  in  these  terms  : 

I  suppose  you  will  not  believe  a  hint,  if  you  take  it,  and  so  I  must 
speak  plainly.  The  prophecies  are  to  be  fulfilled,  the  perplexities 
which  have  vexed  some  of  my  friends  (Mrs.  Cummings  in  particular) 
are  to  be  brought  to  a  perpetual  end,  the  wishes  are  to  be  gratified, 
the  half-hidden  secret  is  to  be  proclaimed  on  the  house-tops,  at  Ame- 
nia  on  Wednesday,  September  17,  185 1.  Will  you  be  there  to  see 
and  be  seen  ?  I  should  be  glad  to  have  you  go  and  see  your  daugh- 
ter come  into  your  family,  and  she  would  be  happy  to  have  you 
present  on  the  occasion.  I  presume  you  would  like  to  see  what  sort 
of  a  daughter  you  are  to  have.  .  .  .  You  shall  be  gratified  in  every 
sense,  I  warrant  you,  if  you  take  me  for  a  judge  ;  and  I  am  some- 
what acquainted  with  your  taste  in  the  matter  ot  daughters.  We 
shall  creep  around  home  by  way  of  Lake  George  and  Champlain. 

The  young  lady  who  went  to  Northampton  as  Mrs. 
Gilbert  Haven  was  every  way  fitted  to  make  her  hus- 
band happy  by  her  personal  qualities  as  well  as  by  her 
eminent  fitness  for  the  important  duties  of  an  itinerant 
minister's  wife.  Two  or  three  years  afterward  she  fell 
under  the  writer's  observation  at  Wilbraham,  during 
her  husband's  pastorate  in  that  delightful  old  town. 
She  was  slight  in  figure,  graceful  in  her  movements  and 
attitudes  ;  had  a  dark  but  fair  complexion,  well  propor- 
tioned  features,  the  rosy  hue  of  perfect  health  flushing 
her  cheeks,  and  her  deep  black  eyes  radiating  light  when 
she  spoke  to  any  body ;  and  a  sort  of  gentle  shyness,  a 
kind  of  delicate  reserve,  protected  her  from  over-hasty 


Northampton.  123 

intrusion  from  people  she  did  not  fancy.  These  may 
sometimes  have  thought  her  cool  and  indifferent,  but 
she  knew  how  to  overcome  such  impressions  when  any 
important  purpose  required  it.  She  was  very  quiet  in 
manner,  not  given  to  much  or  rash  speech,  and  yet  easy 
and  ready  enough  in  conversation.  She  had  a  well-dis- 
ciplined mind,  great  natural  penetration,  an  intuitive 
knowledge  of  men,  and  a  well-poised  independence  in 
her  judgments.  In  all  their  parishes  she  showed  great 
interest  in  her  husband's  success,  both  as  pastor  and 
preacher ;  and  she  aided  him  with  wise  counsel  and 
fruitful  sympathy.  She  had  the  art  of  making  friends, 
and  perhaps  never  lost  one  she  had  won.  She  made 
their  successive  parsonages  real  homes  for  her  husband 
and  his  friends.  She  encouraged  him  to  fidelity  to  ever^' 
duty  and  to  all  his  convictions.  Among  the  rest,  many 
colored  people  were  guests  in  her  house,  and  all  of  them 
received  as  hearty  kindness  at  her  hands  as  if  they  had 
been  aristocrats  in  manners  and  position. 

One  incident  which  she  tells  one  of  her  friends  to  ex- 
plain an  unwonted  pause  in  her  correspondence  will 
show  that  she  won  her  good  name  as  a  pastor's  wife 
legitimately.  She  found  a  family  whose  natural  heads 
and  guides  were  both  ill ;  the  father  with  a  slowly  wast- 
ing consumption,  the  mother  with  some  temporary  dis- 
ease. Their  friends  were  far  away,  and  poverty  was 
their  hard  lot.  As  Mrs.  Haven  was  not  housekeeping, 
she  immediately  felt  called  on  to  devote  herself  to 
them,  and  see  that  they  were  carried  safely  beyond  this 
season  of  special  affliction.    She  says  simply  enough, 


124 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


"  I  could  go  and  care  for  them,  and  I  could  not  let 
them  suffer  alone."  Thus  had  she  unostentatiously 
joined  the  true  army  of  the  living  God,  "  whose  names 
are  enrolled  in  heaven." 

"  And  all  the  way  from  Calvaiy  down 

The  carven  pavement  shows 
Their  graves  v/ho  won  the  martyr's  crown, 

And  safe  in  God  repose  ; 
The  saints  of  many  a  jarring  creed 

Who  now  in  heaven  have  learned 
That  all  paths  to  the  Father  lead 

Where  self  the  feet  have  spurned. 

"And,  as  the  mystic  aisles  I  pace 

By  aureoled  workmen  built, 
Lives  ending  at  the  cross  I  trace 

Alike  through  gloom  and  guilt ; 
One  Mary  bathes  the  blessed  feet 

W^ith  ointment  from  her  eyes, 
With  spikenard  one,  and  both  are  sweet, 

For  both  are  sacrifice." 

That  the  young  wife  contrived  to  have  a  right  cheer- 
ful time  of  it  is  apparent  from  her  own  letters.  One, 
addressed  to  Miss  Elizabeth  Vail,  soon  afterward  the 
wife  of  Rev.  J.  W.  Beach,  gives  us  a  glimpse  or  two  of 
their  joint  lives  : 

Believe  me,  then,  that  I  am  happy  and  contented.  All  things  com- 
bine to  make  this  my  hoine.  A  beautiful  country  round  about,  a  pleas- 
ant boarding-place,  plenty  of  good  things  for  soul  and  body,  a  loving 
parish,  (of  blacks  and  whites,)  a  good  library,  three  lively  songsters, 
and  a  spunky  husband.  Let  the  queen  boast  if  she  can.  It  would 
have  done  you  good  to  have  heard  the  rich  exhortation  our  presiding 
elder  gave  me  last  night  at  class.    He  began  by  tr^nng  to  impress 


Northampton. 


125 


me  with  a  sense  of  my  duties,  responsibilities,  etc.  Then  he  told 
how  often  his  wife  had  been  a  ministering  angel  to  him,  and  hoped 
I  might  be  the  same  to  my  husband,  holding  up  his  hands  as  did 
Moses'  sister  his.  Just  fancy  how  I  sat  under  such  a  benediction. 
.  .  .  I  have  been  trying  to  keep  Gilbert's  hands  at  a  proper  height 
to-day,  but  think  it  will  take  more  than  Brother  Baker  to  make  me 
believe  it  is  my  duty  to  do  it  longer. 

We  went  to  spend  Thanksgiving  with  the  good  friends  at  Maiden. 
Showed  them  that  a  Yorker  couldn't  be  beaten  by  a  Yankee  at  table. 
I  confess,  however,  the  exceeding  glory  of  the  feast.  Had  a  good 
visit  at  Mr.  Cummings's  ;  heard  him  preach  not  so  "big"  a  sermon 
as  I  anticipated,  still  above  the  ordinaiy.  Mrs.  Cummings  retains 
all  her  former  vivacity  and  keenness. 

Some  letters  may  be  the  best  possible  close  to  this 
chapter.  The  two  that  follow  first  were  written  to  his 
sisters  ;  the  one  as  a  farewell  before  marriage,  the  other 
as  a  proof  of  continued  interest  in  them  after  marriage. 
The  last  of  the  two,  though  dated  naturally  enough  at 
"  Canaan,"  was  written  in  Northampton. 

To  the  Home  Folks,  Maiden,  Mass. 

Northampton,  September  12,  1851. 

My  Dear  Unloving  and  Unloved  :  I  ought  to  bid  you  a 
last  adieu,  as  I  leave  the  scene  of  my  solitary  and  wilderness  exist- 
ence (where  we  have  wandered  toward  forty  years)  and  enter  upon 
the  land  flowing  with  milk  and  honey.  I  know  we  have  kept  to- 
gether these  many  years  ;  we  have  scorned  the  pleasures  and  vani- 
ties of  that  state  into  which  beardless  boys  and  vain  girls  have  gone 
because  it  was  fashionable  ;  and  we  have  declared  how  much  happier 
we  were  than  they  all,  how  much  better  off  in  every  respect,  and 
how  impossible  it  would  be  for  them  to  overcome  our  aversion  to  an 
exchange  of  conditions,  however  much  they  might  wish  it. 

Well,  my  sweet  ones,  I  was  one  of  the  chiefest  of  transgressors  in 


126 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


that  way  of  sin ;  I  was  one  of  the  boldest  and  loudest ;  but  I  have 
undergone  a  change — a  change  of  heart,  I  may  penitently  and  yet 
rejoicingly  say — and  that  always  requires  a  change  of  conduct.  But 
as  the  first  duty  connected  with  this  conduct  is  to  renounce  old  fol- 
lies, and  to  declare  to  old  companions  the  wisdom  you  have  acquired, 
so  I  shall,  with  great  brevity  and  plainness  of  speech,  declare  to  you 
the  folly  of  your  present  course  of  thinking  and  acting,  and  urge  to 
a  speedy  repentance  and  abandonment  of  transgression. 

I  threw  in  a  few  lines  carelessly  and  casually  at  the  end  of  my  last 
letter  on  what  I  supposed  might  have  a  little  interest,  when  lo,  all 
the  rest  of  the  letter  is  forgotten— its  sweet  and  holy  memories,  its 
sweeter  and  holier  hopes — and  the  mustard-seed  becomes  instan- 
taneously a  tree,  in  whose  branches  lodge  the  fowls  of  heaven  ;  con- 
versations, letters,  and  I  presume  universal  gossip,  on  the  topic. 
Ah,  my  girls,  you  show  your  nature  there,  as  the  wicked  in  their 
talks  of  virtue  and  goodness.  You  are  without  excuse,  I  see,  and  I 
advise  you  to  be  without  the  need  of  any.  The  last  hours  of  this 
single  man  are  near.  Soon  will  the  noose  be  drawn,  and  I  shall 
leave  you  behind.  Do  you  want  to  know  my  feelings You  can't 
if  you  would,  and  you  shouldn't  if  you  could.  I  shall  have  to  bid 
you  a  long,  I  fear,  long  farewell.  Thronging  memories  crowd  them- 
selves into  these  last  hours,  and  look  as  sadly  and  reproachfully 
upon  me  as  the  angels  of  the  forests  and  the  waters  did  on  Adam 
and  Eve,  as  they  were  about  to  leave  Paradise.  Poor  things  ! 
(both  the  angels  and  the  memories.)  They  couldn't  see  the  mercy 
and  goodness  which  led  them  out ;  that  a  higher  Paradise  opened 
before  them  as  they  left  the  lower  behind.  Well,  my  dears,  don't 
grieve.  I  shall  only  try  to  forsake  the  valueless,  the  disagreeable  ; 
and  though  I  shall  change  the  mold,  yet  the  same  substances  can  be 
wrought  into  shapes  of  greater  beauty.  But  I  beg  pardon  for  this 
long,  sober  talk.-  I  suppose  you  will  think  coming  events  cast  a  very 
heavy  shadow  before.  Well,  the  depth  of  the  shadow  depends  on 
the  amount  of  light  that  falls  on  the  event — and  this  very  gloom 
through  which  I  am  trying  to  lead  you  has  this  Eg}^ptian  darkness 
simply  from  the  intensity  of  the  h'^ht  that  floods  its  other  disk. 


Northampton.  127 

To  the  Home  Folks,  Maiden,  Mass. 

Canaan,  Monday  Evenings  half-past  nine  o'clock^ 

October  13,  1851. 

My  Comrades  through  the  Wilderness,  who  haven't  yet 
entered  the  promised  land,  don't  think  I'm  forgetful  of  you,  or  no 
longer  sympathize  with  your  griefs,  your  loneliness,  your  longings. 
Though  I  have  crossed  over  Jordan,  I  remember  my  "  partners  in 
distress,"  and  would  be  very  willing  to  lend  a  helping  hand  to 
guide  them  to  its  banks,  and  to  steady  them  over.  But  I  will  con- 
fess that  some  of  the  longings  which  arose  in  my  wanderings  in  the 
desert  of  sin  and  celibacy  have  ceased.  The  yearnings  for  the  leeks 
and  onions  of  Egypt,  the  flesh-pots  of  mother's  pantry  and  oven, 
have  ceased  amid  the  rich  fare  of  my  present  abiding  place  ;  the 
Sunday  evening  longings  for  heaven-bringing  music  are  partially 
relieved  by  the  gentle  fingers  and  the  unsinging  accents  that  express 
heaven-reaching  and  heaven-dwelling  thoughts.  The  sisters'  hands 
which  my  helpless  clothes  daily  cried  for,  the  sisters'  voices  which 
my  weary  moments  sighed  for,  the  mother's  food  which  my  hungry 
stomach  sought  for,  the  manly  harangue  which  my  disputatious  pro- 
pensities longed  for,  have  all  subsided ;  the  rents  are  healed,  the  hun- 
ger satiated,  the  silence  resonant,  the  combativeness  gratified,  and  I 
am  left  without  desire. 

Do  you  think  that  this  is  a  confession  of  utter  forgetfulness,  a 
verification  of  the  prophecy  so  often  made,  that  I  should  now  lose  all 
love  for  home  and  "  fixin's  don't  be  alarmed,  nor  go  into  hysterics 
at  my  forgetfulness.  Because  I  have  ceased  to  pine  uselessly,  as  I 
have  done  so  many  years,  I  have  not  therefore  ceased  to  feel.  Be- 
cause I  don't  wet  my  handkerchief  daytimes  and  my  pillow  in  the 
night  with  the  overflowing  of  unsatisfied  desires,  don't  suspect  that 
I  am  unmindful  of  your  existence,  and  void  of  feeling  with  regard  to 
those  who  then  made  me  so  womanish.  I  have  not  forgotten  that  I 
am  a  son  and  a  brother,  and  probably  shall  not  so  long  as  there  is  a 
home  and  Thanksgiving.  I  have  been  waiting  to  hear  from  you,  and 
finding  no  tokens  of  your  remembrance,  I  have  been  fearing  that  my 
example  was  working  like  a  violent  epidemic  upon  you,  and  you 


128 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


were  so  completely  prostrated  by  the  disease,  and  father  and  mother 
so  busy  in  waitmg  upon  you  and  applying  the  remedies,  that  none 
could  write. 

I  have  been  pressed  with  duties,  domestic  and  professional,  and 
have  in  vain  commanded  Mary  to  take  my  yoke  on  her.  The  re- 
fusal to  obey  introduces  anarchy  into  the  social  government,  and  I 
fear  she  will  have  to  be  arraigned  with  the  Christiania  and  Syracuse 
mobocrats  as  guilty  of  high  treason.  With  such  rebellion  here,  and 
such  demands  upon  my  time  elsewhere,  I  haven't  had  time  lo  let 
you  know  my  state  and  standing. 

To  William  M.  Ingrahain,  Esq.,  B7'Ooklyn,  N.  V. 

Northampton,  October  i6,  1851. 

Brother  Bill  :  I  have  been  trying  for  half  an  hour  to  extract 
some  sweets  from  the  writings  of  Mr.  Moses — who,  like  Csesar,  is 
eminent  as  a  general  and  an  author — l:>ut  the  extra  heat,  got  up  by 
the  ipistress  of  the  place,  as  an  accompaniment  to  some  washing 
she  is  doing,  rather  relaxes  the  nerves  which  the  study  of  that  author 
demands  ;  and  I  have  fallen  back  through  half  a  dozen  intermediate 
duties  and  delights  into  a  little  talk  with  you.  Don't  get  provoked 
at  the  inferior  position  you  occupy.  You  would  be  the  first  to  de- 
clare its  low  and  trivial  character  if  you  were  engaged  in  it ;  and 
though  I  indulge  in  it  more  freely  and  frequently,  still  I  have  about 
the  same  opinion  of  it  that  lesser  transgressors  maintain.  Pleasant 
and  profitable  as  social  intercourse  is,  whether  oral  or  written,  it  is 
like  eating  or  smoking — only  good  in  its  place — a  dainty  dish  for  the 
soul,  that  derives  its  real  strength  and  durable  pleasure  from  more 
substantia]  fare.  So  I  descend  from  the  heights  of  Moses  and  his 
compeers,  of  original  meditations  on  similar  subjects— through  pul- 
pit preparation,  pastoral  activity,  literary  reading,  politics,  poetr>% 
novels,  and  newspapers— down  in?o  the  low  but  sunny  nook  of  pri- 
vate, personal  conference.  You  will  prefer,  I  guess,  to  leave  the 
splutter  and  spatter  of  the  washroom,  and  take  a  walk  through  the 
beautiful  streets  and  woods  that  are  now  rather  extra  fine,  tricked 


Northampton. 


129 


out  like  a  Timbuctoo  belle  for  conquest,  or  as  a  victim.  Would  that 
you  were  more  sensible  to  the  beauties  of  nature  that  flourish  and 
decay  outside  of  Amenia  and  Dutchess  County  !  Were  you  not  so 
desperately  infected  with  that  7ios7netism,  of  which  you  once  found 
a  mote  or  two  in  my  eye,  I  might  have  some  pleasure  in  showing  off 
the  scenery-— its  fixings  and  movings — that  surrounds  us. 

I  might  write  you  a  business  letter,  or  an  item  one.  Tell  how  fine 
the  Hudson  looked  to  the  sea-sick  Molly;  how  sweet  was  Saratoga 
Lake,  and  bitter  Saratoga  water,  and  flat  Saratoga  landscapes,  and 
slow  Saratoga  locomotives  ;  how  exquisite  was  Lake  George — the 
most  paradisaical  spot  I  ever  saw — though  it  lacked  one  feature  of 
the  paradise — a  garden,  or  room  for  one,  it  being  all  hills  and  water; 
how  enchanting  were  Lake  Champlain  and  Vanity  Fair,  which  we 
devoured  together,  the  former  being  ahead  of  the  Hudson  as  a  place 
wherein  or  whereat  to  exhibit  the  humanity  of  the  other  ;  how  Bishop 
Hopkins  preached  in  Burlington,  and  the  railroad  in  its  run  through 
a  narrow  valley,  threaded  by  streams,  and  bounded  on  both  sides  by 
high  but  the  greenest  kind  of  mountains,  preached  more  eloquently 
and  profitably  during  the  next  forenoon  ;  how  Boston  haughtily 
looked  down  on  the  opinions  and  feelings  of  the  New  York  pettifog- 
ger, entertaining  as  high  notions  of  her  wealth,  learning,  enterprise, 
elegance,  and  piety  as  ever,  and,  perched  on  her  trio  of  hills,  looked 
most  truly  self-satisfied  ;  how  Maiden  was  up  in  arms  to  receive  us ; 
and  how  the  good  friends  filled  us  with  love  and  luxuries  till  we  were 
forced  to  run  for  our  lives  and  our  flock. 
6* 


130  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  VII. 


W I  LB  RAH  AM. 


The  Ipswich  Conference — Full  Connection — Sent  to  Wilbraham — The  First  Service — 
Early  Preaching— Preparation  for  the  Pulpit— Advice  to  a  IMinister — Spiritualism— A 
Seance — Pastor  Haven  with  the  Young— Missionary  Spirit— J udson's  Example— Birth 
and  Death  of  the  First  Child— New  Friends. 


R.  HAVEN  left  Northampton  to  attend  the  ses- 


^  sion  of  the  New  England  Conference  in  Ipswich, 
opening  April  27,  1853,  under  the  presidency  of  Bishop 
Janes.  Some  bits  of  interesting  information  may  be 
gleaned  from  letters  to  Mrs.  Haven,  at  Northampton, 
throwing  light  on  the  man  as  well  as  the  occasion : 

Brothers  Rice,  Newhall,  Steele,  and  Haven  have  taken  possession 
of  a  house,  and  are  as  quiet  as  the  members  of  a  happy  converts' 
meeting  on  the  camp  ground.  I  shall  be  as  happy  during  the  week 
as  you  are.  We  were  put  througii  to-day,  finishing  up  the  two  years' 
course  of  study  with  an  examination  of  eight  hours. 

Examination  being  safely  over,  Mr.  Haven  and  Fales 
H.  Newhall  write,  each  to  his  wife,  an  account  of  the 
day's  events,  and*  provoke  some  chaffing  thereby : 

Fales  is  writing  to  Netty,  and  they  are  all  laughing  at  us  for  our 
uxoriousness.  We  grin  and  bear  it ;  said  Fales  filling  the  whole 
room  with  laughter,  while  the  other  boys  are  as  the  hills  which 


Fales  offers  to  speak  for  me,  as  I  sit  here  trying  to  think  what  to 
say;  but  he  is  too  busy  now  himself. 


"  Did  rejoice  at  a  young  earthquake's  birth." 


WiLBRAHAM.  I3I 

As  this  will  be  Airs.  Haven's  first  appointment  at  the 
hands  of  the  Bishop,  there  was  a  lively  curiosity  in  at 
least  two  bosoms  as  to  where  it  should  be.  The  letters 
contain  all  the  rumors  that  are  afloat  concerning  that 
point : 

On  the  cars  it  was  reported  that  I  was  going  to  Warren,  and  then 
it  was  stated  that  Shelburne  Falls  had  taken  us  into  its  arms  ;  and 
here  the  East  Winders  are  locating  us  among  their  fogs. 

Thursday  morning  he  was  admitted  into  full  connec- 
tion with  the  Conference,  and  elected  to  deacons'  orders. 
In  accordance  with  the  custom  of  the  Church,  the  young 
ministers  were  called  to  the  altar,  and  addressed  by 
Bishop  Janes.  Another  letter  gives  us  a  welcome  glance 
at  that  interesting  hour : 

Your  letter  came  yesterday  forenoon,  and  was  received  and  read 
by  me  as  I  was  sitting  on  the  front  seat  in  the  church,  with  six  other 
anxious  boys,  waiting  for  the  Bishop  to  give  us  a  long  lecture  and 
admit  us  into  full  connection.  It  was  devoured  as  greedily  and  un- 
ceremoniously as  a  starving  beggar  would  eat  a  snatched  morsel  in 
the  presence  of  royalty.  After  feasting  my  human  heart  upon  tid- 
bits that  would  have  been  tasteless  to  any  other  there,  we  were 
called  up  and  stood  through  a  long  and  eloquent  harangue  on  the 
duties  and  responsibilities  of  the  ministr}-.  Its  eloquence  and  power 
made  it  agreeable,  even  under  such  tiresome  circumstances. 

The  "  six  other  anxious  boys  "  were  the  Revs.  E.  S. 
Best,  Judah  Crosby,  W.  C.  High,  Fales  H.  Newhall, 
G.  M.  Steele,  and  H.  P.  Andrews. 

While  his  time  and  thoughts  had  been  closely  occu- 
pied with  the  business  and  pleasures  of  the  session,  the 
young  minister  has  been  keeping  open  ears  for  tidings 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


of  the  new  appointment.  That  was  before  the  Bishops 
had  introduced  the  custom  of  saying  something  to 
nearly  every  body  concerning  his  probable  appointment. 
Methodist  ministers  who  date  back  to  that  period  of 
awful  silence  will  smile  to  find  in  these  letters  what  their 
own  of  the  same  date  sometimes  contained  : 

Things  look  now  as  if  a  long  jaunt  were  before  you.  The  presid- 
ing elders  are  as  dumb  as  the  grave,  but  there  is  a  demand  for 
preachers  greater  than  the  supply,  and  the  consequences  will  be  un- 
expected upturnings  and  scatterings.  Brother  Butler  says  they  have 
asked  for  Brother  and  Sister  Haven  at  Shelburne  Falls,  so  they  may 
carry  the  day.  There  or  Greenfield,  if  we  stay  under  Brother  Baker  ; 
South  Street,  Lynn,  or  Salem  if  we  come  this  way;  and  Wilbraham 
as  a  compromise,  which,  as  such  things  are  fashionable  now-a-days, 
may  turn  up. 

And  so  it  was. 

Among  those  who  listened  to  Pastor  Haven's  intro- 
ductory sermon  in  the  new  charge  was  the  writer  of  this 
biography,  then  a  student  in  Wesleyan  Academy.  The 
text  was  Acts  v,  20,  "  Go,  stand  and  speak  in  the  tem- 
ple to  the  people  all  the  words  of  this  life."  While  no 
very  full  account  can  now  be  given  of  the  discourse,  one 
hearer  has  a  most  keen  and  vivid  impression  of  the  gen- 
eral air  and  spirit  of  the  service.  The  school  was  un- 
usually full  at  that  time,  and  as  the  church  was  not  a 
very  large  one,  it  was  packed  to  repletion  on  that  cool, 
bright  Sunday  in  May.  Among  the  hearers  who  were 
sure  to  appreciate  all  the  good  points  in  his  preaching 
were  the  teachers  of  the  academy.  The  principal  of  the 
school  was  Rev.  Miner  Raymond,  a  princely  preacher, 


\V I  ABRAHAM.  133 

while  chief  among  the  teachers  were  Mr.  Haven's  col- 
lege classmates,  Oliver  Marcy  and  Fales  H.  Newhall. 
Near  them  sat  G.  M.  Steele,  another  Middletown  boy, 
whose  quick  wits  were  as  appreciative  as  they  were  crit- 
ical. For  perhaps  three  minutes  after  the  bell  had 
ceased  its  solemn,  sad  vibrations  the  audience  sat 
hushed  and  expectant,  when  up  the  aisle  marched  a 
stranger's  figure,  with  a  cool  and  trig  look,  followed  by  a 
little  woman,  trim  and  sprightly  as  a  bird.  There  was  a 
suggestion  of  affectionate  pride  in  the  new  pastor's  bear- 
ing as  he  showed  his  wife  into  the  pew,  a  sort  of  fond 
though  momentary  lingering  over  the  ceremony.  The 
sermon  was  neat  and  clean  in  its  conception,  and  was 
given  in  a  tender  and  fervid  though  not  eloquent  man- 
ner. There  was  some  question  in  some  hearers  how 
they  should  like  the  preacher,  but  probably  all  felt  that 
they  should  like  the  man. 

Perhaps  no  better  occasion  than  this  will  occur  for 
speaking  at  some  length  about  the  characteristics  of 
Mr.  Haven's  early  style  of  preaching.  The  man  was  of 
middle  height  and  size,  with  well  proportioned,  clearly 
but  not  sharply  cut  features,  with  pleasant  but  not  strik- 
ing eyes,  of  neat  but  not  clerical  appearance,  cool  and 
assured  in  bearing.  His  hair  was  always  somewhat 
carelessly  dressed,  and  of  such  a  shade  that  he  used  to 
say,  People  call  it  auburn  when  they  wish  to  be  com- 
plimentary, and  red  when  they  tell  the  truth."  The 
entire  appearance  as  he  stood  in  the  pulpit  was  pleasant 
but  not  impressive.  His  voice  was  not  a  good  one  for 
public  speaking.    It  was  agreeable  and  sweet  if  kept 


134 


Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 


within  its  natural  range  ;  but,  unfortunately,  he  did  not 
keep  it  there  very  carefully.  If  he  was  under  any  par- 
ticular excitement  or  anxiety  he  was  apt  to  pitch  his 
voice  too  high  as  he  began  to  speak,  and  that  defect 
would  then  run  through  the  entire  sermon.  Then  he 
spoke  too  rapidly  at  all  times,  a  fault  which  was  aggra- 
vated by  the  one  just  mentioned.  To  overcome  such 
faults  the  preacher  should  have  had  every  sermon  well 
in  hand,  and  been  able  to  keep  his  voice  under  full  con- 
trol. But  he  was  just  then  full  of  the  notion  that  the 
best  way  to  manage  extempore  preaching  is  to  keep  the 
mind  busy  with  general  literature  and  theological  stud- 
ies through  the  week,  and  then  make  a  brief  and  hot 
preparation  for  the  Sunday  service  on  Saturday.  This 
he  did  in  general  with  much  fidelity,  but  too  often  he 
was  in  the  fix  he  describes  in  a  Saturday  morning  letter 
to  Rev.  G.  M.  Steele  in  1854:  "I  cannot  write  more,  as 
I  have  only  two  sermons  to  preach  to-morrow,  and  two 
ideas  to  be  worked  up  into  perfect  sixty-minute  speeches 
in  these  few  hours." 

On  such  hasty  preparation  he  would  sometimes  im- 
provise remarkably  well,  for  he  had  an  imagination 
which  kindled  easily  and  yielded  marvelous  results. 
But  sometimes  his  fancy  seemed  utterly  inactive,  and 
then,  instead  of  a  perfect  sixty-minute  speech,"  we 
got  a  long-winded  floundering  around  the  text.  And 
this  sometimes  resulted  in  his  worst  early  pulpit  fault ; 
for  at  times  he  would  become  entangled  so  completely 
in  a  sentence  with  many  mutually  modifying  clauses 
as  to  foro;et  how  he  had  started  it  off,  and  either  he 


WiLBRAHAM.  I35 

would  halt  with  the  business  visibly  incomplete,  or 
make  an  end  that  had  no  conceivable  connection  with 
the  beginning.  But  it  should  be  borne  in  mind  that 
such  aggravated  faults  were  rare,  though  he  would 
somewhat  frequently  indulge  in  sins  against  grammar 
and  rhetoric,  which  provoked  the  dull  wits  of  school-boy 
critics  to  universal  and  tiresome  activity.  Enough  of 
this  kind  of  talk  reached  him  to  lead  him  to  write  to  his 
cousin  Otis  soon  after  he  came  to  Wilbraham : 

I  like  here  pretty  well ;  a  fine  congregation,  but  too  much  stu- 
dent, and  hence  too  unsympathetic,  superficial,  and  supercilious  ; 
still  a  good  place  to  mortify  pride  and  vanity  in. 

This  feeling  attended  him  as  long  as  he  remained 
there,  for  in  another  place  he  says  : 

My  Wilbraham  sojourn  is  about  over.  Two  years  of  sun  and 
shower  ;  not  the  pleasantest  possible  in  my  Church  relations.  The 
contraries  of  school  and  town  here  as  every-where  breed  difficulty. 
Though  much  harmony  outwardly  exists,  there  is  great  dissimilarity 
of  tastes.  And  the  great  requisite  for  preaching,  sympathy  with  the 
audience,  is  disturbed  if  not  destroyed  by  this  opposition  of  tastes. 

Of  course,  there  is  some  justice  in  what  Mr.  Haven 
says  on  this  point,  and  also  some  exaggeration.  He  had 
become  weary  of  the  intellectual  fastidiousness  which  is 
generated  in  schools  and  colleges.  He  had  left  Amenia 
partly  to  get  away  from  such  an  atmosphere,  and  preach 
to  men  rather  than  students ;  and  it  was  this  feeling 
which  made  him  a  little  too  sensitive  to  the  criticism 
which  he  had  encountered.  It  was  true  that  he  had 
some  of  the  best  qualities  of  good  preaching  at  that 


13^  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

period.  In  the  first  place,  he  had  a  very  active  mind, 
and  was  intellectually  mature.  He  had  been  seven 
years  out  of  college,  and  had  read  very  widely  in  un- 
usual lines  of  reading.  He  overflowed  with  history  and 
biography.  He  still  kept  Homer  and  Horace  on  his 
desk  for  frequent  perusal.  Shakspeare  was  familiar  to 
him,  while  he  was  now  in  the  flush  of  his  early  worship 
of  Wordsworth  and  the  Lake  School.  Ruskin  was  just 
then  mastering  him,  and  nothing  that  came  from  Carlyle, 
Emerson,  Tennyson,  Browning,  Mrs.  Browning,  Holmes, 
Lowell,  Longfellow,  or  Whittier,  escaped  his  eye.  All 
this  played  into  his  Sunday  preaching,  and  brightened 
it  amazingly.  About  this  time  he  fell  in  love  with  holy 
Herbert  and  Sir  Thomas  Browne. 

His  preaching  was  not  often  of  a  doctrinal  type.  It 
gave  evidence  that  he  had  read  and  compared  the  cur- 
rent doctrinal  systems  with  strong  comprehension  rather 
than  great  logical  acumen.  His  intuitive  powers  were 
very  great,  and  he  relied  mainly  on  their  light  to  guide 
him  safely  through  the  tangle  of  dogmatic  discussions. 
When  he  did  meddle  with  such  topics,  he  handled  them 
with  broad  common  sense  rather  than  any  metaphysical 
subtilty.  Some  bright  hit,  flashed  out  as  he  went  along, 
was  generally  the  best  spoil  the  listener  carried  off. 
Once  he  paused  in  a  poorish  sermon  on  fatalism  in  re- 
ligion to  inject  the  remark,  sotto  voce,  that  one  who 
held  to  such  absurdities  must  find  great  comfort  in  the 
fact  they  were  not  of  his  own  begetting,  but  were  di- 
vinely foreordained  ;  for  why  should  a  man  who  preach- 
es a  poor  sermon  be  held  accountable  for  what  God 


WiLBRAHAM.  1 3/ 

renders  inevitable  any  more  than  for  what  his  neighbor 
does?"  He  delighted  in  the  great  truths  and  principles 
of  the  Christian  scheme,  and  preached  them  with  the 
energy  of  entire  belief. 

His  character  shone  clear  in  his  preaching.  It  was 
religious  to  the  core,  and  Wesleyan  at  every  point,  ex- 
cept that  of  entire  sanctification.  He  finally  settled 
down  to  the  conviction  that  Wesley  is  not  consistent 
with  himself  at  this  point.  This  conviction  clung  to 
him  to  the  last,  and  sometimes  led  to  odd  results.  In 
one  of  his  Conferences  Bishop  Haven  was  one  day  ask- 
ing the  candidates  for  admission  the  prescribed  question 
of  the  Discipline,  ''Are  you  going  on  to  perfection?" 
when  an  elderly  brother  rose  and  said, 

"  Bishop,  will  you  be  kind  enough  to  formulate  in  a 
few  words  the  doctrine  of  Christian  Perfection  for  us  ?  " 

"  Art  thou  a  master  of  Israel,  and  knowest  not  these 
things?"  was  the  victoriously  swift  retort  of  the  unper- 
turbed Bishop. 

Every  body  saw  the  courage  of  his  convictions  com- 
ing out  in  his  expositions  of  Christian  doctrine  and  life. 
He  spared  no  sin  because  it  was  popular,  no  sinner  be- 
cause he  was  rich  or  great.  He  loved  no  Church  like 
his  own,  and  he  scourged  its  faults  and  sins  with  the 
terrible  severity  of  love  ;  he  loved  no  nation  like  our 
own,  and  none  of  her  faults  and  sinfulness  escaped  his 
faithful  eye  ;  he  loved  no  reforms  like  those  of  New 
England,  and  no  other  ever  showed  up  their  defects 
more  unsparingly.  He  kept  up  the  unfashionable 
usages  which  he  deemed  serviceable  to  the  Church. 


138  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


He  always  went  to  camp-meetings  with  his  Church 
members  ;  he  kept  the  love-feasts  and  watch-nights  in 
full  play ;  he  would  have  restored  the  circuit  system  in 
some  parts  of  his  own  Conference,  and  he  sometimes 
sought  out  trembling  penitents  in  his  prayer-meetings 
for  personal  appeals,  and  was  assiduous  in  altar  services, 
where  many  a  sinner  was  led  home  to  the  Lord  Jesus. 
Some  of  these  acts  of  fidelity  cost  him  so  much  effort 
that  their  appeal  to  others  was  rendered  only  the  more 
telling.  He  knew  how  to  make  the  social  meetings  of 
the  Church  interesting  and  fruitful. 

All  the  interests  of  his  flock  were  his  interests,  and  he 
would  share  the  sorest  part  of  any  social  contempt  or 
neglect  that  came  upon  them.  A  friend  in  the  ministry 
who  wrote  him  a  blue  letter  about  such  matters  was  an- 
swered as  follows  from  Wilbraham  : 

So  you  have  been  burning  with  a  blue  flame?  You  found  that  a 
Methodist  minister  is  but  a  small  man  in  these  Puritan  communities. 
I  have  passed  through  that  experience,  have  preached  great  swelling 
words  of  vanity  to  a  few  sleepy  hearers,  and  met  a  congregation  of 
a  thousand  who  had  been  to  a  genteel  church  and  an  orthodox  min- 
ister. I  know  what  it  is  as  well  as  St.  Paul  and  other  itinerants  to 
be  counted  as  the  offscouring — a  little  better  than  my  members,  yet 
disgraced  by  association  with  them.  It's  a  good  lesson  for  you,  a 
first-rate  lesson.  Your  ambition  w^as  growing  rankly ;  you  had  the 
misfortune  to  have  an  ambitious  heart  and  wife,  and  both  needed 
abasement.  You  got  it.  Be  thankful,  and  you  will  come  out  as 
humble  and  good  and  great  as  my  wife  and  I. 

Those  were  days  when  Spiritualism  had  become  ramp- 
ant.    This  delusion  spread  somewhat  among  the  less 


WiLBRAHAM. 


intelligent  and  pious  portion  of  the  community  at  Wil- 
braham.  Stories  were  spread  abroad  about  wonderful 
doings  at  the  seances^  as  their  meetings  were  styled.  A 
certain  Mr.  Glover,  now  styled  professor  and  now  doc- 
tor, from  New  York,  was  the  chief  apostle  of  the  new 
necromancy.  Rumors  were  spread  all  through  the  town 
that  the  ministers  and  other  chief  pillars  of  the  churches 
were  Spiritualists.  Students  in  Wilbraham  at  that  date 
were  often  told  that  Mr.  Haven  was  on  the  point  of 
conversion,  and  that  some  of  their  teachers  were  secret 
believers.  One  of  Mr.  Haven's  letters  to  his  wife  shows 
how  baseless  such  reports  really  were,  and  exhibits  one 
of  those  queer  phases  of  life  which  show  themselves  in 
every  pastor's  history.  To  appreciate  the  citation  in  its 
full  grotesqueness,  it  should  be  remembered  that  all  the 
parties  mentioned  in  the  letter,  except  the  necromancer 
and  his  assistants,  were  the  choicest  spirits  of  the  ]\Ieth- 
odist  Church  in  Wilbraham,  some  of  whom  must  have 
felt  themselves  unclean  for  a  month  after  the  session 
described  : 

I  have  another  item  which  you  ought  to  have  shared  in.  Friday  I 
received  a  rose-colored  note,  addressed  to  Rev.  Henry  Haven  and 
lady,  requesting-  the  pleasure  of  their  presence  at  Dr.  Glover's  to  tea. 
Thinking  I  ought  to  eat  and  drink  with  publicans  and  sinners,  and 
taking  Mrs.  Henry  Haven  inside  me,  I  marched  over.  Found 
Brother  and  Sister  Pickering,  Mother  Moody  and  Lucinda,  Mother 
Virgin,  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Rice,  and  a  pale-looking  man  and  wife  called 
Fairfield.  We  had  a  fairish  supper;  and  after  tea  in  marched  Uncle 
Tim,  then  Rev.  Medium  Jones,  and  then  Mrs.  Olds  and  her  daugh- 
ter. I  talked  till  meeting  time,  then  excused  myself,  and  was  off. 
As  soon  as  I  had  gone.  Dr.  Glover  proposed  that  ihey  should  have  a 


I40  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


meeting.  Dr.  Rice  and  wife,  Mother  Virgin  and  Lucinda  Moody 
followed  me,  leaving  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Pickering  and  Mother  Moody  as 
the  only  outsiders.  The  Fairfield  went  through  her  twitchings,  and 
put  Rev.  Joseph  A.  Merrill,  the  deceased  husband  of  Mrs.  Merrill,  to 
preaching  through  her.  Then  Lorenzo  Dow  took  possession  of  the 
body  and  spirit  of  Fairfield,  and  jerked  out  some  commonplaces. 
Brother  P.  left  before  Dow  got  through,  so  that  he  knows  not  but 
my  spirit  or  some  other  minister's  followed  their  brethren  into  the 
same  receptacle,  and  shone  forth  through  it.  Mrs.  Rice  is  loud  in 
her  flings  at  their  courtesy.  I  think  it  was  decidedly  rich.  I  only 
wish  they  had  asked  me  to  preach.  I  should  not  have  needed  Fair- 
field or  Jones  for  an  interpreter.  'Twas  as  neat  a  specimen  of  Spir- 
itualistic politeness  as  I  have  seen,  asking  and  expecting  us  to  stay 
in  the  evening,  and  preparing  such  an  entertainment.  It  was  as 
much  as  I  expected  of  that  New  York  Yankee. 

It  seems  to  have  been  a  grief  to  Mr.  Haven  that  he 
was  not  able  to  influence  more  largely  the  students  who 
waited  on  his  ministry  at  Wilbraham.  Such  schools  are 
little  worlds  by  themselves,  having  their  own  customs, 
modes  of  religious  contact  and  operation,  and  not  very 
accessible  to  outside  influence.  Its  interests  were  then 
watched  over  by  vigilant  shepherds  of  the  Lord's  flock, 
and  revivals  of  marked  power  occurred  in  the  school. 
Mr.  Llaven  watched  over  the  fruits  of  such  harvest  sea- 
sons with  great  caution.  His  quick  and  confident  judg- 
ments of  the  religious  character  and  talents  of  tlie 
young  people  of  the  school  were  rarely  at  fault.  He 
knew  more  of  them  than  they  suspected,  until  some  in- 
quiry or  suggestion  showed  both  his  interest  and  pene- 
tration. He  seemed  to  know  their  very  thoughts  on 
some  personal  aims.    He  sent  many  a  young  man  out 


WiLBRAHAM.  I4I 

for  the  first  time  to  exhort  or  preach  in  some  out-of-the- 
way  school-house,  "who  might  otherwise  have  remained 
long  unsettled  in  purpose.  Some  of  these  were  after- 
ward surprised  at  the  accuracy  of  his  predictions  of  their 
subsequent  careers. 

Nearly  the  only  material  for  a  religious  interest  in  the 
church  at  Wilbraham  then  was  a  large  group  of  bright 
and  interesting  children  and  youth.  Hence  he  set  him- 
self at  work  to  do  what  he  could  for  their  conversion. 
He  gathered  them  into  a  children's  class,  which  he  con- 
ducted himself  Sunday  afternoons.  His  affectionate  tact 
was  a  perfect  charm  to  these  young  people.  They  had 
special  gatherings  for  prayer  and  religious  counsel, 
through  which  many  of  them  became  real  Christians. 
It  was  a  very  pretty  scene  to  see  twenty-five  or  thirty 
of  these  young  people  gathered  about  him  singing  the 
songs  of  Zion,  speaking  simply  and  in  a  childlike  way  of 
religion,  and  down  on  their  knees  in  prayer.  And  all 
this  was  kept  as  far  removed  from  cant  as  possible.  A 
very  large  proportion  of  these  infant  Christians  were 
ever  afterward  faithful  to  their  vows. 

Another  point  where  the  Wilbraham  Church  felt  the 
skill  of  its  pastor  was  in  the  success  with  which  he  drew 
from  them  the  full  benevolent  collections  which  he 
thought  they  ought  to  make  up.  He  estimated  with 
some  care  just  about  what  the  people  ought  to  pay, 
made  a  brief  and  clear  statement  of  the  matter,  and 
rarely  was  he  obliged  to  say  that  the  amount  taken  was 
less  than  he  hoped  for.  He  made  a  special  effort  to 
increase  the  missionary  gifts  of  his  Church,  and  the  col- 


142 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


lection  was  $400,  a  generous  result  for  so  small  a  so- 
ciety. He  was  so  much  stirred  by  his  efforts  that  he 
thought  seriously  of  becoming  a  missionary  himself,  for 
in  December,  1853,  ^e  wrote  in  the  following  terms  to 
Rev.  A.  J.  Hunt : 

A  book  that  has  stirred  me  like  a  trumpet  is  Judson's  Life. 
What  a  hero !  I  had  no  idea  that  the  greatest  American  hero  was 
showing  his  valor  for  so  many  years  in  that  distant  clime.  It  put 
the  missionary  fire  into  every  drop  of  my  blood.  If  Maiden  raised 
that  apostle  to  the  Gentiles,  should  not  the  same  spot  renew,  though 
feebly,  the  early  power  ?  I  have  been  thinking  much  and  earnestly 
of  pitching  my  tent  in  the  East,  among  those  to  whom  Christ,  the 
Gospel,  and  the  Bible  are  novelties.  I  get  heartily  sick  of  the  idea 
attached  to  preaching  now-a-days.  You  come  with  an  old  story. 
You  must  spice  your  dish  for  Christian  and  sinner,  young  and  old, 
or  they  v^^ill  pronounce  it  flat,  stale,  and  unprofitable.  Your  whole 
aim  is  to  arouse  the  disputatious,  the  emotional,  the  imaginative  in 
your  hearers.  We  don't  stand  where  Luther  and  Wesley  stood,  with 
crowds  of  hearers  only  anxious  for  the  truth.  What  is  Durbin's, 
Olin's,  or  Storrs'  fame,  but  a  fame  for  a  certain  mode  of  presenting 
the  Gospel,  instead  of  the  Gospel  itself  }  I  have  wished  a  hundred 
times  that  I  might  have  weathered  the  trials  of  the  fathers,  that  I 
might  have  shared  their  triumph.  I  have  an  old,  wise,  intelligent, 
orderly  church,  which  makes  me  feel  more  than  ever  the  difference 
between  them  and  their  fathers.  The  most  earnest  and  elaborate 
discourses  preached  by  bishops  or  doctors  couldn't  more  than  mo- 
mentarily excite  them.  They  would  depart,  say  a  few  words  about 
the  sermon,  and  relapse  into  the  ordinary  tenor  of  their  lives.  So  it 
used  to  be  at  Amenia.  How  often  I  have  pitied  B.  M.  Adams,  when 
the  whole  soul  burst  forth  out  of  his  eyes,  hand,  and  mouth,  and  the 
whole  body,  to  see  the  undisturbed  slumbers  of  the  heads  of  the 
church.  I  talk  thus  to  myself  day  after  day,  and  Dr.  Judson  feeds 
the  holy  flame.    Yet  I  decide  not  to  become  a  missionary. 


WlLBRAHAM. 


Still  later  he  writes  in  the  same  vein : 

I  have  thought  much  of  a  missionary  life,  that  this  short  span  may- 
be as  completely  filled  as  possible  with  labors  for  Christ.  I  think 
the  marked  feature  of  my  spiritual  life  this  year  has  been  the  growth 
of  this  missionary  feehng.  Perhaps  I  may  not  gratify  it.  God  only 
knows.  May  he  guide  me  !  May  I  follow  the  Lamb  whithersoever 
he  goeth ! 

This  hot  zeal  did  not  consume  away  into  smoke. 
Not  only  did  he  fan  powerfully  the  missionary  zeal  of 
his  several  churches,  but  he  afterward  made  "  Zion's 
Herald  "  flame  with  the  same  zeal.  He  was  a  most 
zealous  promoter  of  the  founding  of  our  missions  in 
Italy  and  Mexico,  and  his  episcopal  visits  to  the  Libe- 
rian  and  Mexican  missions  were  memorable  eras  in  their 
history. 

There  was  born  to  Gilbert  and  Mary  Ingraham  Haven  , 
a  son  in  Wilbraham,  October  24,  1853,  who  died  June 
12,  1854.  These  events  made  the  impressions  they  al- 
ways make  upon  loving  Christian  parents — great  happi- 
ness, and  then  great  sorrow — but  greater  comfort  in  the 
sorrow.    The  Journal  has  this  entry: 

He  vvas  born  into  heaven  Monday  night  about  eight  o'clock,  as  a 
beautiful  day  was  dying  into  night.  A  great,  great  rending  of  our 
hearts  ;  but  we  tried  to  say,  "  Father,  thy  will  be  done."  We  have 
moved  along  very  cheerfully  but  sadly  in  the  depths  below.  Every 
thing  talks  of  him.  How  strange  the  new  passion  !  How  strange 
the  giving  and  removing  its  object !  I  wrote  a  sermon  on  the  sub- 
ject, but  I  cannot  utter  the  feelings  within. 

Thus  they  strove  "  to  wear  the  robes  of  mourning  as 
cheerfully  as  they  could."    One  cannot  help  thinking 


144  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


how  much  their  sorrow  was  abated  by  the  fact  that  it 
was  divided  between  them,  and  could  be  talked  over. 
Sometime  they  should  go  to  him  ;  but  so  knit  together 
in  love  were  their  souls  that  no  longing  to  go  to  him  at 
the  expense  of  parting  with  each  other  was  thought  of. 
The  we  "  in  those  simple  sentences  is  something  quite 
pathetic,  when  one  reflects  how  soon  Gilbert  Haven  was 
to  adopt  for  his  own  the  words  that  seem  made  to  utter 
his  sorrow : 

"  '  Say  whether 
They  sit  all  day  by  the  greenwood  tree, 
The  lover  and  loved,  as  it  wont  to  be, 
When  we ' — but  grief  conquered,  and  altogether 
They  swelled  such  weird  murmur  as  haunts  a  shore 
Of  some  planet  dispeopled — '  Nevermore.' 

"  Then  from  deep  in  the  past,  as  seemed  to  me, 

The  strings  gathered  sorrow  and  sang  forsaken, 

'  One  lover  still  waits  'neath  the  greenwood  tree, 

But  'tis  dark,'  and  they  shuddered,  *  "Where  lieth  she — 

Dark  and  cold  !    Forever  must  one  be  taken  ?  * 

But  I  groaned,  '  O  harp  of  all  ruth  bereft. 

This  Scripture  is  sadder,— the  other  left ! '  " 

Chief  among  the  choice  gains  of  his  pastorate  in  Wil- 
braham  he  counted  the  renewal  of  his  former  intimacy 
with  his  college  classmates,  Oliver  Marcy  and  Fales  H. 
Newhall,  and  the  gaining  of  several  new  friends.  One 
of  the  latter  was  the  Rev.  Miner  Raymond,  D.D.,  now  a 
professor  in  the  North-western  University,  at  Evanston, 
111.,  for  whose  personal  character,  eminent  pulpit  abili- 
ties, and  power  of  original  thought,  he  had  the  sincerest 
admiration  ;  another  was  the  Rev.  G.  M.  Steele,  in  whom 


WiLBRAHAM.  1 45 

sense  and  humor  meet  in  a  manner  which  would  be  sure 
to  move  Mr.  Haven's  admiration ;  another  was  Mr.  S. 
F.  Chester,  of  whose  hterary  taste  and  discrimination  he 
felt  the  felicitous  charm  ;  and,  finally,  Rev.  H.  W.  War- 
ren, now  Bishop  Warren  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church.  We  shall  have  frequent  occasion  to  speak 
again  of  Messrs.  Steele  and  Newhall  as  members  of  a 
small  club  for  hard  study,  interspersed  with  merry  sal- 
lies— a  club  known  as  The  Triangle." 
7 


140 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  VHI. 
westfield. 

Ordained  Elder— Stationed  in  Westfield— Letter  to  Hunt— Difficulties  in  Westfield— 
Haven  and  Trafton— Despondency  about  Preaching— Peril  of  Scandal— Westfield  News 
— Father  Cadwell— A  Son  Born- A  Glimpse  of  Home  Life— Address  at  Middletown— 
An  Invitation. 

TX  April,  1855,  Bishop  Simpson  appointed  ]\Ir.  Haven 
J-  to  the  pastorate  of  the  Methodist  Society  in  West- 
field.  We  have  no  accounts  of  the  session  of  that  Con- 
ference, save  that  Bishop  Simpson  made  his  first  appear- 
ance as  presiding  Bishop  in  the  New  England  Confer- 
ence on  that  occasion,  and  carried  all  hearts  by  storm 
through  a  wonderful  sermon  on  Sunday  morning,  and 
that  Mr.  Haven  was  ordained  an  elder  on  Sunday  after- 
noon. His  own  account  .of  the  new  charge  and  his 
appointment  to  it  are  found  in  a  letter  to  Rev.  A.  J. 
Hunt : 

Well,  my  boy,  I  see  your  nose  slightly  ascends  at  the  mention  of 
Westfield.  Your  whole  body  and  soul  will  have  to  accompany  said 
nose  in  its  ascension  if  they  would  reach  the  plane  of  excellency  on 
which  Westfield  stands.  I  was  tossed  on  a  sea  of  cabinet  troubles 
that  whole  conference  week,  thrown  like  a  weaver's  shuttle  between 
Lynn  and  Worcester,  Fitchburg,  and  the  Lord  and  the  Bishop  know 
what,  until  their  arms  grew  wear\',  and  I  dropped  here.  Fales  was 
down  for  this  place,  but  he  swore  by  the  vain  gods  of  Latium  that  he 
wouldn't  come.  Others  were  equally  contumacious  on  account  of 
the  great  Know  Nothing  who  reigns  here,  and  so  I  was  made  the 
Curtius  to  fill  the  gulf.    Whether  I  shall  fill  it  or  only  make  the  gap 


Westfield.  147 

worse  is  yet  to  be  seen.  It  is  one  of  the  finest  places  in  Massa- 
chusetts, a  village  in  a  garden.  I  expect  to  enjoy  it  hugely,  as 
such  a  house  and  society  must  be  enjoyed,  if  at  all.  Mary  is  quite 
happy. 

There  were  some  features  of  the  Westfield  Church 
which  would  naturally  have  rendered  the  appointment 
of  Mr.  Haven  perilous.  In  the  first  place,  a  large  pro- 
portion of  the  members  of  the  Church  were  Democrats. 
While  he  was  very  candid  in  conceding  every  man's 
duty  and  right  to  hold  his  own  opinions  and  promul- 
gate them,  he  w^as  a  very  pronounced  Abolitionist,  with 
the  clearest  convictions  about  the  duty  of  Christian  pas- 
tors to  discuss  political  questions  as  an  important  branch 
of  Christian  living.  Yet  he  had  such  w^inning  personal 
qualities,  and  was  so  guarded  against  saying  any  thing 
bordering  on  personal  offensiveness,  that  it  is  easy  to 
believe  that  he  really  anticipated  no  serious  friction 
over  that  point.  He  must  expect  some  difficulty  of  that 
sort  wherever  he  might  be  stationed. 

But  this  was  also  the  period  of  the  Know  Nothing 
movement  in  American  politics.  It  was  one  of  the 
most  foolish  excitements  ever  got  up  over  false  issues  in 
American  partisanship.  The  whole  country  nearly  went 
mad  with  excitement  concerning  the  Catholic  question. 
One  of  Mr.  Haven's  letters  to  his  friends  in  Maiden 
from  Wilbraham  show^s  that  he  saw  the  meanness  and 
unprincipled  character  of  the.w^hole  movement  in  the 
clearest  light.  He  blamed  its  war  against  foreigners 
and  Romanists  as  a  sharp  contradiction  of  the  very 
principles  w^hich  the  Republic  is  set  to  defend  and  dif- 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


fuse.  He  foresaw  that  the  new  party  would  prove  evan- 
escent. The  natural  result  would  be  that  Mr.  Haven 
would  find  himself  in  political  sympathy  with  only  a 
small  portion  of  his  flock.  Even  this  would  not  have 
obstructed  his  path  to  success,  since  the  Westfield 
Church  had  always  been  as  remarkable  for  harmony  in 
sustaining  its  pastors  as  the  new  pastor  was  for  tact  in 
asserting  his  personal  convictions. 

The  predecessor  of  ]\Ir.  Haven  at  Westfield  was  the 
Rev.  and  Hon.  ]\Iark  Trafton,  a  brilliant  preacher,  then 
in  the  finest  flower  of  his  popularity.  The  Westfield 
Know  Nothings  had  aided  the  movement  which  had 
made  Mr.  Trafton  the  successful  candidate  of  their 
party  for  Congress  from  that  district.  With  the  con- 
sent of  "Sir.  Trafton,  the  Westfield  stewards  tried  to 
bring  about  an  arrangement  by  which  Mr.  Haven 
should  exchange  every  other  Sunday  with  Mr.  Trafton, 
then  stationed  at  Mittineague.  Mr.  Haven  was  urged 
to  comply  with  this  proposal,  and  his  kind  but  firm  re- 
fusal grieved  some  of  his  supporters.  Some  of  the  par- 
ties to  the  affair  may  still  remember  their  embarrass- 
ment when  the  new  pastor  quietly  remarked  that  he 
supposed,  no  doubt,  they  had  taken  as  much  pains  to 
obtain  the  consent  of  the  IVIittineague  officials  as  they 
had  to  obtain  his  own. 

This  spirited  course  cost  Mr.  Haven  some  good  feel- 
ing, some  friends,  and  many  hours  of  patient  medita- 
tion. To  aggravate  matters,  a  new  Congregational 
Church  was  started  during  the  year,  under  the  leader- 
ship of  a  new  and  popular  pastor,  though  too  much 


Westfield.  149 

bent  on  success  to  be  at  all  times  polite  and  fraternal. 
"  Our  own  discord  and  their  free  seats  and  pressing  en- 
treaties of  the  congregation,  and  even  of  our  members, 
have  affected  us  some  for  good  and  for  bad.  The  con- 
gregation has  fallen  off  fifty  to  seventy-five,  and  the  pew 
rents  even  more  in  proportion.  But  social  meetings 
have  improved,  and  the  Church  is  now  in  better  work- 
ing order." 

The  resulting  irritation  showed  itself  in  an  attempt  to 
secure  Mr.  Haven's  removal  at  the  end  of  the  first  year. 

They  got  up  quite  a  storm  over  my  return,  but  the 
majority  was  against  them,  and  I  submitted  without  a 
will."  That  he  submitted  without  a  word  need  not  be 
believed,  however  meek  his  general  bearing.  One  of 
the  stories  which  held  its  course  about  this  period  was 
told  in  the  form  of  a  dialogue  between  Messrs.  Trafton 
and  Haven. 

Trafton.  Brother  Haven,  I  have  made  up  my  mind 
to  take  a  trip  to  Canada  this  summer.  If  you  will  go 
along  with  me,  look  after  the  baggage,  etc.,  I  will  pay 
your  bills. 

Haven.  Thank  you,  Brother  Trafton,  you  are  very 
kind.  But  you  must  excuse  me,  I  don't  think  I  should 
enjoy  playing  second  fiddle  in  Canada  any  better  than  I 
should  in  Westfield. 

But,  although  there  was  some  keen  sparring  over  the 
subject,  there  was  no  want  of  kind  feeling  on  either  side. 
Mr.  Trafton  was  always  on  the  most  cordial  terms  with 
his  successor.  The  latter  greatly  admired  the  wit  and 
audacity  of  his  brilliant  friend.    Agreeing  in  the  main 


150  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

on  public  and  ecclesiastical  questions,  they  had  some 
points  of  collision,  around  which  they  kept  up  a  con- 
tinual blaze  of  argument  and  repartee.  One  of  these 
points  was  the  rightfulness  of  women's  voting.  Years 
afterward  they  used  to  visit  different  places  together  to 
discuss  this  question  before  large  and  interested  au- 
diences. One  would  open  the  ball  with  a  statement  of 
his  views  of  the  subject,  and  then  the  other  would  fol- 
low with  either  a  retort  or  a  counter  statement,  as  he 
chose.  Returning  from  one  of  these  occasions,  Mr. 
Haven  told  the  following  story  of  their  joint  labors  the 
night  before  :     Last  evening  Trafton  and  I  went  off  to 

 ,  on  our  duel  over  Women's  Suffrage.     I  spoke 

first,  and  had  a  tip-top  time  putting  my  case.  Every 
point  told,  and  the  audience  evidently  enjoyed  it.  Just 
as  I  was  closing  I  said  to  myself,  '  Wonder  how  Trafton 
will  manage  this  thing?  He  can't  answer  it,  and  he  will 
not  own  up.'    So  I  wound  up,  and  sat  down  happy." 

The  sympathetic  listener  asked,  "  Well,  how  did 
Trafton  manage  it?" 

"  Manage  it  !  "  said  Haven,  "  manage  it !  Why,  of 
course,  he  managed  it.  I  should  like  to  see  the  thing 
he  couldn't  manage.  But  then,  he  didn't  do  it  fairly, 
though  ;  he  knew  he  couldn't  answer  that  argument, 
and  he  was  a  great  deal  too  bright  to  try.  Trafton 
could  give  Danton  odds  in  audacity,  and  beat  him  every 
time.  I  don't  think  there's  another  man  alive  who 
would  dare  to  play  the  game  he  played  last  night." 
How  was  it  ?  " 

Why,  this  is  how  it  was :  You  see,  the  old  fox 


Westfield.  151 

knew  he  couldn't  touch  the  argument,  and  that  the 
audience  was  with  me,  and  so  he  took  a  new  line.  He 
marched  out  on  the  platform,  looked  no  end  of  pity 
and  scorn  out  of  his  flashing  eyes,  and  then  said,  '  La- 
dies and  gentlemen,  did  you  ever  hear  such  an  impo- 
tent attempt  at  argument  as  that?  Some  things  are  so 
utterly  preposterous  that  the  only  sensible  way  to  deal 
with  them  is  to  laugh  at  them,  and  that  is  what  I  am 
going  to  do  with  Brother  Haven's  speech.  I  wish  you 
would  all  join  me  in  laughing  at  it  as  it  deserves.' 
Then  that  old  fellow  went  at  it  and  laughed  with  all  his 
might,  and  so  naturally,  that  others  began  to  laugh,  too, 
and  in  three  minutes  that  entire  audience  was  convulsed 
with  laughter.  They  laughed  like  maniacs,  and  it  seemed 
as  if  the  hideous  roar  would  never  end.  Why,  every 
body  laughed,  and  I  laughed  with  them.  When  the 
fun  was  over  Trafton  complimented  the  crowd  on  their 
good  sense,  and  said  there  was  no  need  of  his  showing  the 
logical  weakness  of  a  speech  which  they  had  shown  such 
contempt  for.  I  told  them  that  Brother  Trafton's  speech 
was  more  logical  than  it  usually  was.  They  laughed 
some,  but  I  couldn't  save  the  fight.  Probably  most  of 
that  audience  didn't  see  that  I  was  not  squarely  beaten. 
Trafton  is  a  cool  head." 

A  man  of  such  qualities  could  not  resist  the  social 
charm  of  Mr.  Haven.  Personally  they  were  on  the  best 
of  terms  during  Haven's  Westfield  pastorate  as  well  as 
afterward.  Nevertheless,  the  young  pastor  was  some- 
what disturbed  over  the  evident  want  of  pulpit  gifts 
which  he  supposed  to  be  implied  by  such  an  affair. 


152 


Life  of  Gilbert  Ha  vex. 


Such  thoughts  troubled  him  a  great  deal,  for  the  Jour- 
nal says,  May,  1856: 

I  often  have  grave  doubts  as  to  being  in  the  way  of  duty.  I 
think  I  cannot  make  a  successful  preacher,  having  never  had  any 
great  influence  in  the  pulpit.  Whether  I  ought  to  stay  in  it  or  go  to 
other  fields  of  labor  God  knows.  I  shall  follow  his  will  so  far  as  I 
can  learn  it ;  and  1  believe  he  will  declare  it  to  me.  I  have  a  very 
pleasant  place  and  many  pleasant  people.  Yet  somehow  my  inter- 
course with  them,  though  free,  is  to  myself  forced.  I  do  not  love  it 
as  one  ought,  to  succeed  perfectly.  It  is  work,  pleasant  and  faith- 
fully done,  but  yet  work,  seen,  felt,  in  its  burdensome  nature. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  Mr.  Haven  grounds  his  judgment 
that  he  should  never  become  a  successful  preacher  on  his 
visible  want  of  pulpit  success  rather  than  any  personal 
perception  of  the  faults  that  hindered  him.  His  mind 
was  full  of  information,  and  plans  of  sermons  swarmed 
upon  his  hands  as  he  studied  the  Scriptures.  The  very 
affluence  of  his  ideas  and  words  made  it  desirable  that 
he  should  prepare  his  sermons  with  great  care.  In  those 
times  he  always  did  best  when  he  wrote  out  his  sermons 
in  full.  Not  only  do  his  sermons  on  political  topics 
show  qualities  which  would  make  any  man  a  pulpit  suc- 
cess, but  the  earliest  of  his  written  sermons  0^1  the  com- 
mon themes  of  the  Gospel  were  much  more  successful 
than  his  extempore  ones.  Writing  kept  him  from  split- 
ting up  his  theme  into  too  many  subdivisions,  and  held 
his  attention  closer  to  the  topic  he  had  to  treat.  But 
even  the  written  sermons  of  that  period,  except  the  polit- 
ical ones,  show  defects  which  he  needed  to  escape.  He 
composed  his  discourses  w^ith  great  heat  and  rapidity. 


Westfield.  153 

Not  unfrequently  a  sermon  would  be  thrown  off  at  a 
single  sitting  on  Saturday  and  preached  the  next  day, 
without  the  firm  and  careful  revision  which  should  al- 
ways purge  such  hasty  productions.  He  took  the  op- 
posite course  from  that  followed  by  Dr.  Bushnell,  of 
whom,  in  the  earlier  years  of  his  ministry,  his  biogra- 
pher says :  The  writing  of  sermons  for  Sunday  occu- 
pied him  nearly  all  the  week.  In  those  days  he  WTote 
slowly  and  with  a  good  deal  of  labor.  The  work  that 
should  have  ceased  with  the  morning  was  too  often 
carried  on  through  the  day  and  into  the  evening  hours." 
Had  Mr.  H^iven  been  willing  to  take  similar  pains  with 
his  work,  he  might  have  ranked  among  the  best  preach- 
ers of  our  time.  Yet  he  gradually  escaped  the  main 
faults  which  marred  his  early  preaching.  He  grew  fa- 
miliar with  theological  truth,  and  shaped  it  into  forms 
of  his  own,  which  frequently  recurred  in  his  discourses. 
Then  practice  taught  him  to  avoid  too  great  complexity 
of  sermon-plans,  and  too  great  detail  in  executing  them. 
Still  the  impression  clung  to  him,  after  he  had  become 
editor  of  Zion's  Herald,"  that  he  w^as  weak  as  a 
preacher.  Turning  the  theme  over  with  a  friend,  he 
said,  "  I  became  convinced  after  a  time  that  I  should 
not  make  a  success  in  the  pulpit.  I  couldn't  see  why 
my  preaching  wasn't  as  good  as  Newhall's  or  Studley's. 
Indeed,  I  thought  it  was  better ;  only  I  could  not  per- 
suade other  people  that  it  was.  Once,  when  Newhall 
was  about  to  leave  Bromfield  Street,  I  exchanged  with 
him.    I  took  one  of  my  best  sermons,  gave  it  in  my 

best  style,  and  said  to  myself,  '  I  wonder  if  they  will  not 
7* 


154  Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 

nibble  at  my  hook?'  But  those  big  fish  would  not  even 
nibble — didn't  seem  to  know  that  I  wished  they  would. 
That  was  about  the  only  time  that  I  ever  fished  for 
stewards  instead  of  men,  and  I  fared  as  I  deserved." 

Of  course,  we  can  see  from  such  statements  how  in- 
tensely the  young  preacher  had  longed  to  match  the 
preaching  of  such  men  as  Storrs,  Bushnell,  Olin,  and 
Durbin.  He  had  studied  the  matter  with  great  dili- 
gence and  eagerness.  His  later  accounts  of  such 
preachers  as  Spurgeon,  Beecher,  Gumming,  and  Pun- 
shon  show  how  well  he  had  marked  and  remembered 
every  element  of  pulpit  excellence  he  had  ever  encount- 
ered. It  was  this  sort  of  success  that  he  despaired  of 
reaching.  He  had  many  an  uncomfortable  hour  over 
the  subject,  and  never  did  accept  defeat  in  his  own 
mind.  But  it  should  not  be  supposed  that  the  feelings 
we  have  now  described  were  the  ones  which  generally 
prevailed  as  he  went  about  his  daily  work.  His  abiding 
conviction  was  that  the  ministry  was  his  true  calling, 
that  he  had  something  special  to  say  to  the  Methodist 
Ghurch  and  the  world  on  the  kindred  sins  of  slavery  and 
caste,  and  that  he  was  to  have  a  degree  of  success  in 
the  plodding  tasks  of  a  faithful  pastor  over  which  he 
might  well  be  thankful. 

It  was  sometimes  remarked  among  Mr.  Haven's 
friends  how  wonderful  it  was  that  no  breath  of  scandal 
ever  was  so  much  as  breathed  against  his  good  name 
from  any  quarter.  He  was  so  free,  so  approachable,  so 
ready  to  listen  to  all  kinds  of  people,  that  such  a  mishap 
would  not  have  been  strange.    Probably  most  of  his  old 


Westfield.  155 

parishioners  at  Westfield  will  learn  with  surprise,  and 
for  the  first  time,  that  he  stood  on  the  perilous  edge  of 
such  a  ministerial  trial  while  he  was  their  pastor.  The 
incident  on  which  the  peril  was  founded  is  told  in  a  let- 
ter written  to  the  Maiden  friends  from  Westfield  on 
Thanksgiving  Day,  but  whether  in  1855  or  1856  cannot 
be  made  out : 

I  think  I  will  go  to  bed,  for  I  am  some  tired.  Every  day  this 
week  until  to-day  I  have  been  at  work  in  the  woods,  chopping  and 
piling  logs.  One  of  my  brethren  gave  me  all  I  would  chop  dowm. 
So  I  have  been  as  busy  as  Billy  Wait  used  to  be,  and  accomplished 
about  as  much.  I  have  piled  up  about  eight  cords  in  the  woods 
awaiting  the  coming  of  sledding.  It  was  very  pleasant  work  these 
nice  warm  days.  My  little  paddy  protege,  (who  smiles  just  like 
Landon,  and  is  as  nice  a  little  Protestant  as  one  can  well  come 
across,)  and  1  worked  together  in  the  sunny  solitudes  as  happy  as 
the  squirrel  Adjidaumo. 

This  nice  little  paddy,  with  the  Landon-like  smile, 
with  whom  Pastor  Haven  worked  for  three  days  in  the 
sunny  solitudes  of  the  Westfield  woods,  was  a  woman. 
Just  fancy  how  such  a  story,  had  it  once  attracted  any 
body's  attention,  would  have  sped  through  the  shops 
and  stores  of  rumor-loving  Westfield.  And  to  think  of 
the  good  name  of  one  who  was  blameless  as  Joseph  ex- 
posed to  such  a  peril !  Perhaps  the  reader  wonders  how 
such  a  transaction  running  on  for  three  days  should  have 
escaped  every  body's  attention.  It  was  the  most  nat- 
ural thing  in  the  world,  however,  for  the  woman  was 
dressed  in  men's  clothing.  She  had  come  to  Westfield 
in  that  disguise,  had  appeared  in  the  role  of  a  convert 


156 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


from  Catholicism,  and  had  awakened  Mrs.  Haven's  in- 
terest to  procure  him  suitable  employment.  He  worked 
in  the  parsonage  garden  and  about  the  places  of  some 
of  the  Westfield  families,  and,  as  he  had  nothing  else 
to  do  at  the  time,  had  offered  his  assistance  to  Mr. 
Haven  in  his  wood-chopping  expedition.  Work  was 
afterward  procured  for  the  fellow  in  either  a  whip  shop 
or  a  cigar  factory;  and  some  months  afterward  he  was 
discovered  to  be  a  woman.  She  cleared  up  all  doubts 
as  to  her  story  about  her  antecedents.  No  stain  had 
ever  fallen  on  her  character  either  at  Westfield  or  else- 
where. The  sole  m.otive  alleged  for  her  disguise  was 
that  she  could  earn  twice  the  wages  as  a  man  that  she 
could  as  a  woman. 

Pastor  Haven  and  his  wife  looked  each  other  in  the 
eyes  with  amazement  when  the  story  reached  them. 
They  had  both  been  without  a  suspicion  of  the  real 
state  of  the  case.  They  had  no  doubt  but  somebody 
would  recall  the  joint  labors  of  the  minister  and  his 
protege  {e),  but  it  seemed  to  have  faded  completely  out 
of  the  recollection  of  all  who  knew  it.  Meanwhile  the 
pure-minded  pair  at  the  parsonage  walked  in  the  perfect 
confidence  of  perfect  integrity. 

Some  glimpses  of  his  Westfield  life  may  be  gathered 
from  a  letter  to  his  m.other-in-law  : 

You  asked  me  to  write  you  a  letter.  What  in  the  world  you  want 
of  a  letter  of  mine  is  more  than  I  can  imagine.  Such  silly  and  sin- 
ful stuff,  so  unlike  what  the  old-fashioned  Methodist  preachers  talked 
and  wrote,  would  only  make  you  more  sure  that  the  world  is  going 
from  bad  to  worse  as  fast  as  time  and  the  wicked  One  can  carr}-  it. 


Westfield. 


157 


...  I  spent  last  week  at  a  camp-meeting,  and  enjoyed  it  exceed- 
ingly. I  thought  how  much  you  would  love  to  be  there,  and  how 
this  choicest  of  delights  is  unprized  and  unenjoyed  by  all  your  chil- 
dren in  all  their  generations.  That  was  the  text  I  meant  to  have 
preached  this  sermon  from,  and  no  mere  love-sick  cr  nonsensical 
one  ;  but  the  old  Adam  was  too  strong  for  the  young  Christian.  I 
spent  four  days  in  a  very  beautiful  grove,  on  the  top  of  a  high  hill,  in 
great  peace  and  quietness,  and  with  enthusiasm  enough  to  make  it 
lively  and  powerful.  I  suppose  the  meetings  of  to-day  are  not  much 
like  what  you  have  seen,  either  in  the  tents  or  around  them.  Both 
the  good  people  and  the  bad  are  more  quiet  in  their  exercises  than 
of  old.  The  wild  crowds  around  were  comparatively  harmless,  and 
'  the  companies  in  the  tents  corresponded.  Yet  there  was  no  lack  of 
life  ;  sermons  were  good,  and  full  of  feeling ;  some  as  much  so  as 
any  I  ever  heard  in  my  life.  Meetings  very  melting,  uniting,  and 
heavenly.  No  place  like  the  woods  to  worship  God  in  ;  the  singing 
good,  old,  earnest,  thunderous ;  the  praying  right  up  into  heaven ; 
preaching,  as  by  Christ,  in  the  open  air,  with  no  walls  of  wood  and 
stone,  of  fashions  and  frivolities,  for  the  Spirit  to  break  through. 

I  suppose  you  would  like  a  Methodistic  talk  to  wind  up  this  long- 
linked  sweetness,  extending  from  dog  days  to  black  frost.  The  kind 
of  religion  called  Methodism  of  the  old  sort  doesn't  flourish  very 
much  here,  though  the  people  called  Methodists  are  quite  numerous. 
We  have  the  materials  for  the  old  kind  of  Methodists,  the  shouting, 
weeping,  melting  sort,  hut  they  are  dumb  and  dry.  Here  and  there 
one  remains.  Prominent  among  these  is  an  old  man,  Father  Cad- 
well,  very  poor,  yet  very  rich.  His  talks  of  God  and  with  God  are 
richer  than  any  I  ever  heard  elsewhere.  Not  Dr.  Olin,  in  all  his 
glory,  had  a  soul  arrayed  like  this  simple-hearted  Simeon.  Yet  his 
words  are  often  powerless.  The  people  murmur  at  the  length  of  his 
talks  and  prayers.  They  never  see  the  open  heavens  which  his  faith 
brings  near  them.  You  mustn't  think  we  are  all  dead  in  trespasses 
and  sins.  New  souls  are  added  to  the  Church  weekly,  and  many 
are  active  and  progressive.  But  the  old-fashioned  power,  without 
the  noise  and  with  it,  is  a  rare  guest  at  our  meetings. 


158 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


In  a  biography  of  Gilbert  Haven  something  more 
seems  required  concerning  "  P^ather  Cadwell."  Mr. 
Haven  frequently  spoke  of  him  as  a  remarkable  instance 
of  the  purifying  and  inspiring  power  of  a  personal  experi- 
ence of  religious  truth.  Before  his  conversion,  Mr.  Cad- 
well was  a  man  of  simple  habits,  living  in  a  hermit-like 
solitude,  somewhat  addicted  to  profanity  and  strong 
drink,  sad,  meditative,  and  silent  before  strangers.  In  a 
remarkable  revival  of  religion,  under  the  ministry  of 
Rev.  Guy  Noble,  a  local  preacher,  Mr.  Cadwell  became 
a  professed  Christian.  This  made  no  change  in  his  ex- 
ternal way  of  living,  except  that  it  purged  him  of  his 
former  vices,  and  made  him  a  regular  attendant  on  the 
whole  round  of  Methodist  religious  services.  He  had 
no  education  beyond  the  simplest  rudiments  of  knowl- 
edge, knew  nothing  of  local  or  national  politics,  and  had 
no  desire  to  gain  secular  wisdom.  Upon  his  religious 
life  his  entire  attention  was  concentrated.  He  read. the 
Bible  only  so  far  as  it  spoke  to  his  own  mind  and  heart ; 
the  gospels,  and  the  Psalms,  and  the  prophets,  he  fed 
upon  day  by  day.  He  brought  an  uncaptious  mind  and 
a  loving  heart  to  the  preaching  of  God's  holy  word,  tak- 
ing its  rebukes  to  heart  as  faithfully  as  its  promises.  He 
compared  in  love-feasts,  watch-nights,  prayer-meetings, 
and  class-meetings,  his  own  religious  life  with  that  of 
others.  So  entire  was  his  humility  that  pride  never 
hindered  his  growth  in  piety.  Thus  he  naturally  devel- 
oped a  wisdom  in  the  things  of  God  which  was  a  surprise 
to  many. 

He  had  been  instructed  to  take  literally  the  Pauline 


Westfield.  159 

text,  ''With  the  heart  man  beHeveth  unto  righteousness, 
and  with  the  mouth  confession  is  made  unto  salvation," 
hence  he  made  confession  of  his  religious  experience 
with  the  simplest  sincerity.  His  solitary  house  was  the 
scene  of  much  prayer.  He  spent  many  a  lonely  night- 
watch  in  that  delightful  communion  with  God,  besides 
his  regular  seasons  of  fervid  and  vocal  devotion.  In  this 
way  he  grew  wonted  to  the  language  as  well  as  the  act 
of  prayer.  His  native  dialect  was  such  pure  Yankee, 
that  he  was  a  sort  of  converted  Hosea  Biglow.  This 
led  to  a  remarkable  blending  of  the  simple  and  grand 
language  of  the  Scriptures  with  the  racy  phrases  of  the 
rustic  Yankee.  Those  who  appreciated  the  religious 
value  of  the  humble  man  were  wont  to  speak  with  won- 
der of  the  marvelous  way  in  which  this  simplest  of  men 
would  interest  and  move  a  large  vestry  full  of  all  sorts 
of  people.  Mr.  Haven  used  to  say  that  people  would 
hold  their  breath  in  amazement  over  his  most  exalted 
flights.  Such  was  the  man  who  appeared  to  Mr.  Haven 
a  lingering  representative  of  the  old-fashioned  Meth- 
odists. 

On  the  30th  of  January,  1856,  a  second  son  was  born 
to  the  pastor  and  his  wife.  His  advent  is  narrated  to  a 
friend  as  follows : 

We  have  a  new  Paul  Dombey  squaring  off  at  existence  and  scream- 
ing, as  the  Spaniards  say,  because  of  the  sharp  and  painful  clutch  of 
Satan.  Said  child  of  Adam,  therefore  sinner,  and  child  of  Christ,  and 
therefore  saint,  till  he  decides  for  himself  which  he  will  be,  appeared 
among  us  the  30th  of  last  January,  and  has  sustained  his  part  in  the 
family  concert  with  great  effect  ever  since.    He  is  fat,  if  not  saucy. 


i6o 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


keeps  up  a  continual  grin  at  existence,  and  will  undoubtedly  achieve 
his  destiny  here  and  hereafter.  May  it  be  a  holy  and  blessed  one 
through  grace  divine  !  We  talk  of  calling  him  William,  partly  after 
several  friends  of  his  parents  who  bear  that  prefix,  partly  because  it 
condenses  his  character  into  a  word  and  a  title,  Will-I-am,  and 
hence  like  the  prophetic  ones  of  Scripture  or  those  posterity  appends 
to  developed  lives,  very  judiciously  embodies  in  the  person  at  the 
start  what  it  is  known  he  will  be. 

Pleasant  days  were  these  at  the  Westfield  parsonage 
with  the  darling  wife  and  welcome  child.  Mr.  Haven's 
happiness  over  it  all  went  flashing  off  in  letters  and 
journals,  and  possibly  sermons,  too.  Here  is  a  Teniers- 
like  interior,  thrown  off  for  the  boy's  grandmother  In- 
graham  : 

Mary  has  run  away  this  morning  with  another  chap,  (Brother  Sav- 
age and  wife,)  as  perhaps  you  have  judged  from  my  recommencing 
this  talk.  A  little  after  sunrise  she  started  off  for  the  woods  chest- 
nutting,  leaving  me  and  the  baby  to  take  care  of  ourselves.  It  is  now 
noon,  and  she  has  not  returned  yet.  I  don't  know  as  she  ever  will. 
Young  America  Ingraham  Haven  has  stuck  to  his  bed  most  of  the 
time,  though  he  is  just  now  squirming  in  my  left  arm,  while  my  right 
makes  obeisance  to  you.  You  haven't  seen  the  snapping  turtle,  as 
William  calls  him.  He's  got  some  snap  in  him,  and  the  turtle  be- 
gins to  develop  more  and  more  as  he  progresses  in  his  locomotion. 
He  looks  as  well  as  you  could  expect  considering  his  parentage.  I 
hope  he  will  make  up  in  Ingraham  "  intellec'  and  carictur  "  for  his 
unfortunately  Havenic  type  of  countenance.  But  Molly  has  re-ap- 
peared, and  I  must  appear  grateful,  even  to  the  neglect  of  you. 

In  the  summer  of  1856  Mr.  Haven  visited  Middle- 
town,  at  Commencement,  to  attend  the  tenth  anniversary 
of  the  graduation  of  his  class.    He  was  invited  to  make 


Westfield. 


i6i 


the  main  address  to  the  class,  and  performed  the  task 
with  such  tact  and  fehcity  as  to  make  quite  a  stir  in  col- 
lege circles.  This  was  a  success  which  had  a  very  espe- 
cial charm  for  Mr.  Haven.  Few  men  ever  have  cher- 
ished the  memories  of  college  life  and  remembered  their 
classmates  more  affectionately  than  he.  The  invitation 
to  speak  on  such  an  occasion  on  such  a  theme  touched 
his  heart,  and  so  he  knew  how  to  touch  everybody's 
heart  in  turn. 

Rev.  D.  D.  Whedon,  D.D.,  the  newly  elected  editor  of 
the  "  Methodist  Quarterly  Review/*  was  induced  by  the 
quality  of  this  speech  to  ask  Mr.  Haven  to  write  for  that 
journal.  This  result  of  his  Middletown  performance 
was  the  more  welcome  to  him  because  some  articles  of 
that  sort  which  he  had  sent  to  Dr.  M'Clintock  had  been 
politely  declined.  This  literary  and  college  recognition 
gratified  him  the  more  because  it  came  to  him  amid 
his  trials  in  the  Westfield  pastorate. 


62 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  IX. 


THE  TRIANGLE. 


Successive  Friendships  —  Characteristics  as  a  Friend— The  Triangle —The  Three 
Angles— G.  Haven,  F.  H.  Newhall,  G.  M.  Steele— The  Fourth  Angle,  D.  Steele— Fun 
and  Work— Letter  from  the  'Cute  Angle. 


EW  men  ever  enjoyed  the  companionship  of  those 


^  they  met  in  the  routine  of  daily  Hfe  more  than  Gil- 
bert Haven.  There  was  a  democratic  element  in  his  feel- 
ings as  well  as  convictions  which  found  full  and  instant 
expression  in  a  cordial  and  spontaneous  interest  in  those 
around  him.  On  first  seeing  him  in  such  circumstances, 
one  might  suppose  him  perfectly  satisfied  with  such  so- 
ciety, so  complete  would  be  his  apparent  absorption  in 
it.  Yet  there  was  always  a  tendency  to  have  a  small  knot 
of  special  intimates  with  whom  his  relations  would  be 
more  free  from  constraint  or  reserve.  Before  his  college 
days  this  trait  showed  itself  in  connection  with  such  men 
as  the  Revs.  William  Rice  and  George  Landon,  and  the 
winter  he  was  teaching  in  Saugus  with  the  same  Rev. 
Mr.  Rice  and  Pales  Henry  Newhall.  In  college  he  was 
a  general  favorite  with  all  classes :  yet  he  counted  it 
among  the  proudest  of  his  undergraduate  honors  that  he 
was  a  member  of  the  Eclectic  Society.  But  this  habit 
prevailed  even  within  the  circle  of  that  society.  In  his 
own  class  Newhall  and  Ingraham  were  his  elect  Eclectics  ; 
and  in  the  class  of  '45  John  W.  Beach,  as  in  the  class  of 


The  Triangle.  163 

'47  Charles  H.  A.  G.  Brigham,  had  a  very  high  place  in 
his  esteem.  At  Amenia  E.  O.  Haven  and  \V.  Al.  Ingra- 
ham  were  his  inner  companions  while  they  continued 
there,  and  then  came  Alexander  Winchell  and  A.  J. 
Hunt.  George  Steele  and  Fales  Henry  ^ewhall  were 
in  similar  relations  with  him  during  his  pastorate  at  Wil- 
braham.  When  they  were  scattered  so  widely  that  such 
association  became  impossible,  a  much  younger  class  of 
men  grew  into  similar  intimacy  with  him.  In  a  familiar 
letter  to  an  old  friend,  written  soon  after  he  became  ed- 
itor of  "  Zion's  Herald,"  he  mentions  the  following  new 
companions,  members  of  the  New  England  Conference : 
W.  F.  Mallalieu,  S.  F.  Upham,  D.  H.  Ela,  M.  M.  Park- 
hurst,  J.  O.  Knowles,  L.  T.  Townsend,  and  G.  Prentice. 
All  these  were  warm  and  welcome  friends  of  the  new  ed- 
itor, and  some  of  them  grew  to  be  as  intimate  friends  as 
he  had  ever  possessed.  He  had  a  much  wider  circle  of 
welcome  acquaintances,  who  never  became,  in  this  higher 
sense,  intimate  acquaintances.  Any  person  who  had 
once  entered  into  this  closer  relationship  never  dropped 
out  of  it.  Distance  and  want  of  time  might  render  the 
chances  of  meeting  rare,  but  all  the  partners  in  that 
goodly  fellowship  were  always  ready  to  renew  it.  He 
went  on  making  friends  in  this  wa}' of  all  the  companion- 
able men  about  him.  We  should  mention  more  names, 
but  for  the  risk  of  not  being  able  to  stop.  ]\Ien  who 
rarely  entered  into  such  relations  found  it  almost  impos- 
sible to  resist  his  cordial  presence  ;  and  to  many  a  shy 
and  recluse  nature  his  gentle  intrusions  were  welcome  as 
sunrise.    Some  of  his  views  and  ways  shocked  and  re- 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


pelled  Bishop  Janes  as  those  of  few  people  could,  yet 
that  devout  but  magisterial  man  at  last  grew  to  love  him. 
There  were  other  Bishops  who  regarded  his  elevation  to 
the  episcopate  as  a  public  calamity,  and  yet  poured  out 
their  tears  like  rain  upon  his  coffin. 

Hence  the  circle  of  his  sincere  friends  was  always 
growing.  It  was  not  possible  for  the  looker-on  to  say 
who  was  only  acquaintance  and  who  intimate  friend. 
But  there  was  a  tender  kindness,  a  swift  and  delicate 
consideration  for  such,  which  the  recipients  could  not  fail 
to  recognize.  For  them  he  was  ever  on  the  alert  to  do 
or  say  something  to  evince  his  tenderly  real  regard. 
With  them,  too,  he  felt  an  irresistible  impulse  to  be  na- 
kedly sincere  and  true.  His  friendships  usually  began 
with  some  kind  and  appreciative  act  on  his  part.  Then 
would  come  mutual  study,  approach,  sympathy,  and  at- 
traction. This  would  be  the  time  for-  ceremony  and 
compliment.  With  many  he  could  never  go  beyond  this 
point,  and  these  never  became  really  his  intimates.  He 
said,  like  Emerson,  "  A  friend  is  a  person  with  whom  I 
may  be  sincere.  Before  him  I  may  think  aloud.  I  am 
arrived  at  last  in  presence  of  a  man  so  real  and  equal 
that  I  may  drop  even  those  undermost  garments  of  dis- 
simulation, courtesy,  and  second  thought,  which  men 
never  put  off,  and  may  deal  with  him  with  the  simplicity 
and  wholeness  with  which  one  chemical  atom  meets 
another." 

Without  having  philosophized  about  it,  Mr.  Haven 
carried  these  ideas  into  his  connection  with  his  real 
friends  more  thoroughly  than  is  common,  even  among 


The  Triangle. 


165 


the  sovereigns  of  this  realm.  The  compHments  would 
presently  open  the  way  for  the  recognition  of  the  v\-hole 
character  of  the  new  friend  ;  and  then  it  would  appear 
that  Haven  knew  all  his  bad  points  just  as  well  as  his 
good  ones.  But  his  expression  of  all  this  would  be  so 
pervaded  with  kindliness  that  it  all  seemed  the  result, 
not  of  an  effort  to  know  your  weaknesses,  but  to  help 
you  against  them.  These  relations  once  established  with 
any  person  were  kept  up  with  great  care.  For  instance, 
he  had  got  on  such  a  footing  in  college  days  with  the 
Rev.  Charles  H.  A.  G.  Brigham,  who  became  a  Calvinist 
at  the  theological  school,  and  was  settled  over  a  Congre- 
gational Church  at  Enfield,  Conn.  They  rarely  met,  ex- 
cept at  Commencement,  in  Middletown,  but  never  failed 
to  encounter  each  other  as  men  who  could  afford  to  say 
any  thing  of  and  to  each  other.  Mr.  Haven  liked  every- 
body to  show  respect  enough  for  his  own  convictions  to 
act  on  them.  Hence  he  used  to  tell,  with  the  raciest  en- 
joyment, about  Brigham's  coming  to  college,  after  he 
was  converted  to  the  bluest  Calvinism,  and  reading  at 
chapel  prayers  the  first  chapter  of  the  Epistle  to  the 
Galatians,  as  if  that  settled  the  whole  question.  We 
find  in  the  Journal  this  smiling  remark  about  the  same 
man :  "  Had  a  characteristic  note  from  him  the  other 
day,  in  which  he  berates  our  side  roundly  :  '  Arminian- 
ism  is  the  doctrine  of  the  carnal  heart,'  etc." 

Of  all  these  groups  of  interior  friends,  perhaps  the  one 
known  as  "  The  Triangle  "  best  deserves  an  extended 
account ;  first,  because  it  ran  on  from  its  foundation,  in 
1854,  until  it  was  broken  up  by  the  successive  elections 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


of  Daniel  Steele  to  the  Chair  of  Greek  in  Syracuse  Uni- 
versity in  1862:  of  Fales  H.  Xewhail,  in  1863,  to  the 
Chair  of  Belles-Lettres  in  Wesleyan  University,  at  ]\lid- 
dletown  ;  and  of  George  M.  Steele  to  the  presidency  of 
Lawrence  University,  at  Appleton,  Wis,  Then  the  per- 
sons forming  "  The  Triangle  "  were  at  a  similar  stage  of 
their  development.  They  were  all  graduates  of  the  same 
college  ;  they  had  all  been  several  years  out  of  college ; 
they  had  all  selected  the  clerical  profession  ;  they  had  all 
joined  the  same  Conference  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church  ;  they  were  all  at  the  same  stage  of  the  endeavor 
to  adjust  themselves  to  its  self-sacrificing  work,  and  they 
were  all  inspired  by  similar,  if  not  equal,  desires  to  become 
skillful  in  the  word  of  God,  masters  in  the  pulpit,  and 
well  read  in  general  literature.  Such  associations  cannot 
be  repeated  in  the  experience  of  the  same  person ;  and 
it  follows  that  a  study  of  Mr.  Haven's  career  gains  great 
illumination  from  a  careful  survey  of  one  such  elect 
group.  If  we  needed  authority  for  this  course,  we  should 
find  it  in  the  remark  of  a  prince  of  recent  criticism, 
that  we  must  carefully  note  in  the  case  of  every  study 
of  a  talented  man,  "■  the  first  knot,  the  first  group  of 
friends  and  contemporaries  in  which  he  found  himself  at 
the  moment  when  his  talent  broke  forth,  took  form,  and 
became  adult.  By  group  I  mean,  not  the  fortuitous  and 
artificial  assemblage  of  intellectual  people  who  combine 
for  some  purpose  ;  but  the  natural,  and,  as  it  were,  spon- 
taneous association  of  young  minds  and  youthful  talents, 
not  exactly  similar  and  of  the  same  family,  but  of  the 
same  brood  and  the  same  spring-tide,  hatched  under  the 


The  Triangle. 


167 


same  star,  and  who,  with  varieties  of  taste  and  vocation, 
feel  themselves  born  for  a  common  work." 

What  they  attempted  to  do  in  The  Triangle  "  will 
be  told  by  a  member  thereof.  But  perhaps  it  would  be 
going  too  far  to  expect  them  to  furnish  pen  sketches  of 
each  other  as  they  were  in  those  bright  and  happy  days. 
An  outsider  can  speak  with  no  dread  lest  he  see  them 
other  than  they  were  under  the  strange  mirage  of  a  fond 
memory. 

Fales  Henry  Newhall  was  several  years  younger  than 
Mr.  Haven,  always  his  peer,  and  in  college  a  shade  his 
superior  in  scholarship.  He  was  a  genuine  product  of 
the  institutions  of  New  England.  He  had  grown  up  in 
a  country  village  between  Lynn  and  Boston,  but  so  near 
the  former  that  his  youthful  ears  must  have  feasted  on 
the  picture-suggesting  tones  of  "The  Bells  of  Lynn" 
long  before  they  were  "  heard  at  Nahant  "  by  Longfel- 
low, and  interpreted  to  the  world.  He  was  of  the  old 
Lynn  Methodist  stock,  had  been  trained  to  be  honorable 
as  a  matter  of  course,  and  to  piety  as  a  natural  fealty  of 
strong  and  good  minds  to  God  ;  he  was  a  Christian  to 
the  inmost  core,  and  a  Methodist  by  choice  as  well  as 
ancestry  ;  he  had  many  points  of  agreement  with  the 
other  angles  of  The  Triangle,"  set  off,  however,  by 
points  of  dissimilarity.  While  all  were  good  scholars, 
he  was  doubtless  the  one  to  whom  scholarship  was  more 
a  vocation  than  to  the  rest.  He  had  not  only  a  clearer 
sense  of  what  such  a  calling  demanded  and  promised, 
but  a  greater  readiness  to  subordinate  other  pursuits  to 
this.    He  was  from  the  outset  the  most  finished  writer 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


and  speaker  among  them.  His  early  sermons  showed 
careful  study,  conscientious  preparation,  and  studied  de- 
livery. His  ordinary  preaching  might  show  less  sudden 
and  moving  inspiration,  fewer  touches  of  creative  genius, 
than  Mr.  Haven's  did,  but  it  w^as  also  free  from  the  un- 
guarded statements  and  defects  of  style  which  marred 
Haven's  discourses  at  the  worst  moments.  He  had 
more  refinement  in  thought  and  manner  than  either  of 
his  friends. 

The  main  point  of  further  difference  between  him  and 
them  was  a  certain  lack  of  original  wit  and  humor,  qual- 
ities in  which  they  abounded.  It  would  be  wholly 
wrong  to  attribute  to  him  any  defect  of  perception  for 
wit  and  humor,  as  it  flashed  out  in  their  intercourse.  If 
really  nothing  less  than  a  surgical  operation  can  intro- 
duce the  point  of  a  jest  into  a  Scotchman's  head,  Mr. 
Newhall  w^as  not  Scotch ;  his  appreciation  was  instan- 
taneous and  complete.  But  all  that  he  added  to  their 
sometimes  uproarious  mirth  w^as  applause  and  stimulat- 
ing laughter,  or  such  good  stories  as  he  chanced  to  recall. 
They  used  to  say  jocosely  that  Fales  was  an  indispensa- 
ble partner  in  their  fun,  because  they  could  tell  over  all 
their  old  stories,  sure  of  his  unfailing  applause ;  but  in 
that  inconsiderate  remark  a  touch  of  malice  made  them 
forget  that  the  part  of  appreciator  easily  drops  into  that 
of  claqueur,  when  the  actors  are  friends.  On  the  side  of 
imagination  Newhall  stood  as  much  nearer  Haven  than 
any  other  as  G.  M.  Steele  did  in  the  realm  of  wat.  He 
was  a  brilliant  rhetorician  and  declaimer,  and  he  added 
to  these  excellent  qualities  something  further,  the  secret 


The  Triangle.  169 

of  the  real  orator,  the  skill  to  enchain,  fascinate,  and 
electrify  audiences.  Hence  he  was  the  preacher  in  this 
little  knot  of  friends.  Had  he  not  been  retired  from  act- 
ive service  on  account  of  wounds,  Mr.  Newhall  would 
have  been  as  useful  and  honored  as  the  best. 

George  M.  Steele  has  been  so  far  described  already 
that  only  a  few  supplementary  touches  will  be  required. 
His  fundamental  quality  is  cool  and  clear  common- 
sense.  This  is  re-enforced  by  the  trait  which  Yankees 
style  'cuteness  ;  the  other  members  of  The  Triangle" 
used  to  call  him  the  'cute  angle,  and  he  never  dishon- 
ored the  title.  He  has  that  melancholic  taint  which 
haunts  many  persons  of  genuine  wit.  He  is  as  remark- 
able for  the  latter  quality  as  Mr.  Haven  was,  so  that 
things  would  naturally  be  lively  whenever  they  met. 
Many  stories  used  to  run  their  rounds  illustrating  this 
peculiarity  in  Mr.  Steele.  In  a  class  which  began  Greek 
under  him  at  Wilbraham  was  a  spirited,  impulsive,  and 
independent  young  lady  named  Hurlbutt.  She  was  an 
accurate  and  brilliant  scholar  ;  she  was  uniform  in  her 
work,  but  not  quick  to  recover  her  mental  poise  when 
once  she  had  lost  it.  One  day  it  fell  to  her  to  decline 
veavLa^^  a  young  man.  Simple  as  the  task  was  she  got 
flustered,  and  stopped  short,  with  a  flushed  face.  Mr. 
Steele,  knowing  that  she  could  do  it,  said  in  an  encour- 
aging tone, 

"  Miss  Hurlbutt,  decline  veavia^." 

Deeper  flushes  and  persistent  silence  were  the  only 

response. 

Try  again,"  said  the  teacher. 
8 


I/O 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Sharp  and  sudden  came  the  answer, 
I  will  not!" 

Every  body  was  startled  ;  they  had  never  heard  such 
an  answer  there  ;  yet  every  body  knew  that  the  young 
lady  was  far  from  intending  the  utter  discourtesy  her 
words  expressed.  But  by  this  time  her  nerves  were  in 
such  a  strained  condition  that  the  lightest  words  of  re- 
buke would  have  released  a  flood  of  tears.  But  instead 
of  the  expected  reproof  came  the  following  quietly  given 
comment : 

Please  take  notice,  young  gentlemen,  that  Miss 
Hurlbutt  will  not  decline  a  young  man." 

The  next  five  minutes  were  spent  in  laughter,  and  a 
comfortable  atmosphere  pervaded  the  room. 

Sometimes  this  gift  served  him  well  when  he  was  in 
the  ministry  in  enabling  him  to  puncture  with  careless 
seeming  hand  absurdities  which  either  did  not  require 
or  would  not  admit  severer  handling.  Some  good  peo- 
ple in  his  congregation  one  day  asked  him  to  give  out 
notice  of  a  "  holiness  meeting."  ^'  O  yes,  of  course," 
said  the  courteous  pastor.  Then,  with  an  expression  of 
bewilderment,  he  added,  "  By  the  way,  what  are  all 
these  meetings  I  hold  for  ?  " 

It  may  be  imagined  that  two  such  men  as  Gilbert 
Haven  and  G.  M.  Steele  sometimes  made  the  meetings 
of  "  The  Triangle  "  lively.  But  that  was  one  of  the  ends 
"  The  Triangle"  was  meant  to  achieve;  its  members 
needed  such  relaxation,  and  did  their  graver  work  all 
the  better  for  it.  On  one  occasion  Mr.  G.  M.  Steele 
reached  the  meeting  two  or  three  hours  behind  time. 


The  Triangle.  171 

He  found  the  other  members  sitting  gravely  at  their 
task,  greatly  interested  in  it,  with  dictionaries  and  works 
of  reference  open  around  them.  He  made  an  apology 
for  his  tardiness,  which  was  coldly  received.  Sugges- 
tions that  were  not  exactly  complimentary  were  thrown 
out,  and  an  unwillingness  to  go  over  the  hard  work  they 
had  got  through  for  the  benefit  of  the  laggard  was  aired. 
But  when  he  had  eaten  humble  pie  enough,  it  came  out 
that  they  had  done  nothing  but  chat  until  he  was  seen 
coming,  when  they  had  suddenly  donned  the  air  of  toil 
for  his  humiliation. 

It  is  clear  from  Mr.  Haven's  papers  that  the  amount 
of  Greek  and  Hebrew  read  in  those  meetings  was  some- 
what larger  than  that  stated  by  Dr.  G.  M.  Steele  in  the 
letter  to  be  given.  First  and  last  Mr.  Haven  read 
Isaiah,  the  Psalms,  Genesis  and  Job.  There  was  a  pro- 
posal made  that  he  should  prepare  a  commentary  on 
Job  in  the  series  issued  under  the  editorship  of  Dr. 
Whedon,  at  New  York.  He  made  some  preliminary 
studies  for  such  a  work,  but  very  justly  felt  that  he  had 
not  the  requisite  learning  for  the  task,  and  a  similar 
feeling  led  him  to  decline  a  proposal  from  the  same 
source  that  he  should  prepare  a  History  of  Christian 
Doctrine  of  the  first  three  centuries.  These  proposals 
were  rejected  as  early  as  1865,  and  about  that  period  Mr. 
Haven's  interest  in  learned  pursuits  fell  away.  He  did 
not  intend  that  it  should  be  so,  but  his  pen  was  enlisted 
in  the  service  of  the  "  Christian  Advocate,"  and  "  The 
Independent,"  and  other  papers.  Hebrew  gradually 
became  unfamiliar  to  him  after  that  point,  and  he  only 


172  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

reviewed  the  New  Testament  and  Homer  in  Greek. 
His  interest  in  such  studies  was  very  great,  but  neither 
in  theology  nor  bibhcal  science  did  he  ever  gain  emi- 
nence. 

But  his  reading  w^as  immense,  especially  in  the  realm 
of  new  books  ;  but  even  there  it  followed  no  definite 
plan.  What  he  happened  to  have  on  hand  that  was 
interesting  he  was  sure  to  read,  and  chance  had  much 
to  do  with  the  order  of  his  readings. 

The  Rev.  Daniel  Steele  became  a  member  of  this  set 
at  a  later  period  in  spite  of  the  absurdity  of  having  a 
four-angled  Triangle."  He  was  like  the  rest  in  his 
profession,  theology,  aims,  devotion  to  study,  compan- 
ionable qualities,  and  downright  sincerity.  He  stood 
nearest  to  Newhall  in  the  general  cast  of  his  mind,  and 
farther  than  he  from  the  humorous  angles  of  "  The  Tri- 
angle." A  thorough  scholar  and  industrious  student  and 
careful  preacher,  he  lacked  some  of  the  more  popular 
traits  of  his  associates.  He  had  neither  Newhall's  ora- 
torical gifts  nor  the  humor  of  G.  M.  Steele  and  Haven ; 
but  he  represented  hard  work,  conscientious  devotion  to 
all  truth,  and  faithfulness  to  the  souls  of  men.  He 
needed  the  relief  of  such  an  association  as  "  The  Trian- 
gle," and  found  profit  and  recreation  in  its  meetings. 

Rev.  G.  M.  Steele,  D.D.,  has  kindly  given  the  follow- 
ing account  of  the  little  coterie  and  its  work  in  a  private 
letter  : 

WiLBRAHAM,  December  7,  1880. 

My  Dear  Prentice  :  You  asked  me  to  give  you  some  account 
of  the  meetings  for  study  and  diversion,  in  which  Newhall,  Haven, 
and  myself,  and  afterward  Daniel  Steele,  indulged  from  twenty  to 


The  Triangle.  173 

twenty-five  years  ago,  and  which  under  the  various  cabalistic  names 
of  Nodes,  Symposia,  and  especially  "  Triangle,"  became  so  fam- 
ous in  our  small  circle.  I  am  not  certain  that  I  can  recall  details 
enough  to  make  any  adequate  representation  of  our  meetings,  but 
I  can,  at  least,  give  you  some  general  notion  of  them. 

I  think  the  subject  was  first  broached  in  a  letter  from  Newhall  to 
Haven.  It  was  early  in  the  conference  year  of  1854-55  that  we 
met  together  at  Wilbraham  and  first  devised  a  definite  plan  of  study 
and  agreed  upon  a  course  of  reading  in  Hebrew  and  Greek.  Our 
first  meeting  in  pursuance  of  this  plan  was  at  Wilbraham,  June  26, 
1854.  During  that  conference  year  we  met  some  five  or  six  times 
regularly,  besides  some  partial  meetings  at  Springfield,  Wilbraham, 
and  Warren.  The  next  year  we  were  more  widely  separated,  and 
met  less  frequently,  but  still  kept  up  the  compact  and  plan  of  study. 
Afterward,  as  we  all  had  our  appointments  in  the  vicinity  of  Boston, 
we  met  more  regularly,  and  it  was  then  that  Daniel  Steele  came  in 
with  us.  The  usual  custom  was  to  meet  and  spend  a  part  of  two 
days  and  one  night  together.  We  had  as  our  central  and  more  sys- 
tematic work  a  certain  definite  amount  of  Hebrew  in  one  of  the  Old 
Testament  books,  and  of  Greek  from  one  of  the  classic  authors.  I 
cannot  tell  precisely  the  amount  of  our  reading,  but  I  think  we  went 
through  with  the  whole  of  Isaiah,  most  of  the  Psalms,  and  in  addi- 
tion parts  of  Job  and  Daniel.  We  also  read  Plato's  "  Gorgias,"  the 
"  Apologia,"  and  "  Phasdo  ;"  also  Demosthenes  on  "  The  Crown," 
and  a  little  of  Homer.  There  was  frequent  resort  to  the  Greek  Tes- 
tament ;  but  as  this  was  supposed  to  be  a  part  of  our  regular  relig- 
ious diet,  we  did  not  apportion  it  out  in  regular  lessons.  Of  course, 
these  subjects  furnished  us  with  occasions  for  endless  discussions  on 
topics  of  theology,  philosophy,  sociology,  politics,  morals,  literature, 
etc.,  and  it  was  not  an  unusual  thing  for  several  hours  in  the  day  to 
be  consumed  in  animated  discussion  or  hot  debate,  in  which  there 
was  wit,  sarcasm,  brilliant  repartee,  sharp  rejoinder,  in  which  the 
utmost  latitude  and  largest  personal  liberty  were  indulged,  where 
the  most  savage  criticism  of  one's  favorite  views  was  likely  to  be 
exercised,  and  that,  too,  with  scarcely  the  possibility  of  provoking 


174 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


resentment.  Of  course,  there  was  a  large  amount  of  recreation, 
often,  no  doubt,  bordering  on  mental  dissipation,  mingled  in  with 
our  graver  work.  We  usually  had  under  consideration  some  liter- 
ary work  of  high  character,  not  always  of  the  more  solid  kind, 
though  sometimes  this  was  the  case  ;  while  recent  speeches,  lect- 
ures, new  movements  in  politics,  ecclesiastical  affairs,  literature,  art, 
philosophy,  and  reforms,  claimed  and  received  their  full  share  of  at- 
tention. There  were  also  free  discussions  on  our  religious  work  and 
religious  experience,  as  well  as  of  our  Church  affairs,  not  in  any  for- 
mal or  very  solemn  manner,  but  with  entire  freedom  and  naturalness, 
just  as  about  any  other  matters.  The  mutual  personal  criticism  was 
quite  as  free  as  any  thing  else.  We  were  rather  unsparing,  and 
sometimes  incontinently  severe.  There  was  censure  and  praise  and 
reproach  and  ridicule  and  suggestion  and  encouragement,  all  mixed 
up  indiscriminately  to  all  appearance,  yet,  I  am  sure,  to  the  greatest 
profit.  These  meetings  were  seasons  of  marvelous  interest,  and 
of  no  small  excitement.  They  were  not  always  characterized  by 
great  dignity,  nor  noted  for  decorum.  But  they  were  times  of 
enlargement,  and  at  the  same  time  of  memorable  enjoyment  to  all 
of  us. 

The  latter  years  of  our  association  there  was  very  likely  to  be  some 
literary  enterprise  of  one  or  more  of  us,  which  came  under  discussion 
and  had  to  stand  the  test  of  a  pretty  cold-blooded  (the  blood  some- 
times getting  a  little  heated,  however)  examination  and  analysis — 
some  published  sermon,  some  newspaper  or  magazine  article,  and 
just  at  the  last  we  had  each  of  us  arrived  at  the  dignity  of  a  "  Quar 
terly  Review  "  production,  if  not  of  several. 

We  had  also  taken  names  which  were  suggested  by  our  reading  in 
Daniel,  "  whose  name  was  Belteshazzar,"  which  Haven  applied  to 
Daniel  Steele,  and  which  easily  suggested  the  designation  of  Shad- 
rach,  Meshach,  and  Abednego,  for  Newhall,  myself,  and  Haven,  re- 
spectively. We  used  to  talk  about  the  thing  in  a  facetiously  exag- 
gerated manner,  till  some  rather  innocent  souls  began  to  be  appre- 
hensive of  a  widespread  secret  society,  embracing  nobody  knew  how 
many  of  our  educated  young  men,  who  were  aiming  at  the  control  of 


The  Triangle, 


1/5 


the  Conference,  and  perhaps  having  ulterior  and  more  extensive  de- 
signs. I  don't  think  we  ever  did  any  thing  to  minify  this  terrific  ap- 
prehension ;  at  least,  our  style,  especially  Haven's  style,  of  joking 
about  it,  made  it  loom  like  a  tree  in  a  fog,  only  more  so. 

We  kept  it  up  till  about  i860,  or  nearly  six  years.  Then  the  ex- 
citement of  the  times,  the  greater  pressure  of  individual  cares  and 
duties,  and  the  altered  situations  of  some  of  us,  caused  the  special 
meetings  to  cease  for  the  most  part,  and  finally  to  become  a  matter 
of  history  and  memory.  But  these  reminiscences  wert  among  the 
choicest  of  all  our  lives,  and  none  of  us  has  ever  ceased  to  cherish 
them  as  some  of  the  richest  of  our  mental  treasures.  On  his  death- 
bed Haven  recalled  it  in  his  final  conversation  with  Daniel,  and 
showed  that  it  occupied  a  warm  place  in  his  affections. 

I  think  you  can  get  from  the  foregoing  description  all  that  you  will 
need  to  give  a  fair  representation  of  what,  though  it  may  not  be  of 
much  public  interest,  was  always  regarded  by  Haven  as  no  small 
factor  in  the  formative  influences  of  his  life.  You  need  not  be  told 
that  the  influence  going  out  from  him  was  far  greater  than  any  acting 
upon  him  from  the  rest  of  us.  He  was  not  so  much  of  a  student  as 
Newhall,  but  he  had  a  broader  grasp  and  a  quicker  intuition  and  a 
deeper  insight.  Daniel  was  a  hard-working,  plodding  student,  never 
brilliant,  and  seldom  witty  ;  still  his  contributions  to  the  common 
stock  were  often  considerable.  I  have,  perhaps,  reckoned  myself 
rather  ostentatiously  as  an  equal  partner  in  this  enterprise ;  and  so, 
perhaps,  I  was,  in  some  sense,  socially  and  convivially.  But  it  w^ould 
be  of  no  consequence  to  say  that  each  of  the  others  was  my  superior 
by  a  large  majority  in  any  intellectual  comparison. 


i;6 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  X. 

ROXBURY  AND  CAMBRIDGEPORT. 

Roxbury  and  Cambridgeport— The  Great  Revival— Havens  Work  as  Pastor— Trip  to 
Eastham— The  White  Mountains— Life  and  Love  at  Flood— A  Daughter  Bom— Sad 
Forebodings — Death  of  Mary  Haven, 

"  I  "HE  materials  for  a  somewhat  full  account  of  the  Hfe 
of  Gilbert  Haven  from  1857  to  i860,  in  his  pastor- 
ates at  Roxbury  and  Cambridgeport,  do  not  exist.  For 
the  first  time  since  his  early  college  life,  the  Journal  lapses 
into  almost  complete  silence.  After  October,  1856,  and 
down  to  1864,  it  yields  only  five  pages  of  such  records. 
The  first  is  a  rapid  summary  of  Church  and  personal 
news,  the  others  are  a  letter  of  four  sparkling,  but  not 
newsy  pages,  to  the  Rev.  A.  J.  Hunt.  The  old  friends 
of  the  Amenia  period  were  now  nearly  all  married  and 
settled  down  to  steady  professional  work,  so  that  letters 
grew  rare,  while  Maiden  and  home  were  but  six  miles 
away,  so  that  correspondence  with  those  friends  largely 
ceased.  The  members  of  "  The  Triangle  "  were  all  with- 
in easy  reach  of  each  other  during  this  period.  Their 
frequent  meetings  rendered  much  letter  writing  needless, 
since  all  personal  news  w^ould  naturally  be  exchanged 
and  discussed  at  these  gatherings.  Preparation  for  their 
sessions,  in  addition  to  full  work  in  their  parishes,  left 
them  sm.all  leisure  for  writing.  Some  time  during  his 
residence  in  Westfield  Mr.  Haven  took  up  the  practice 


ROXBURY  AND  CaMBRIDGEPORT.  1 7/ 

of  writing  for  the  Methodist  press,  a  habit  which  gradu- 
ally absorbed  much  of  his  time  and  strength. 

The  few  items  of  news  entered  in  the  Journal  are  such 
as  must  have  made  a  deep  impression  on  his  mind.  The 
birth  of  nephews  and  nieces,  of  his  daughter  Mary,  the 
7th  of  May,  1858,  and  the  death  of  his  sister  Anna  in 
1857,  iT^ust  have  had  their  own  deeply  moving  sugges- 
tions for  the  mind  and  heart  of  the  busy  pastor.  The 
great  religious  revival  of  1857  was  a  season  of  refresh- 
ment and  progress  for  the  Roxbury  Church.  It  was 
such  a  movement  as  would  naturally  arouse  all  Mr. 
Haven's  interest  and  strain  his  energies  to  their  utter- 
most tension.  Yet  the  only  record  in  the  Journal  bear- 
ing on  that  remarkable  event  is  this :  "  There  was  a 
great  revival  here  and  every-where  last  winter.  About 
a  hundred  joined  this  Church,  and  have  witnessed  a  good 
confession."  It  would  be  very  interesting,  if  we  had  the 
means  for  doing  so,  to  trace  Mr.  Haven  throughout  that 
solemn  and  yet  triumphant  season,  mark  his  personal 
participation  in  the  revival  work,  and  obtain  his  reflec- 
tions upon  the  entire  event.  A  lady  who  then  waited 
on  Mr.  Haven's  ministry  was  converted  during  that  re- 
markable revival,  and  has  maintained  a  faithful  Christian 
walk  ever  since,  always  speaks  of  him  as  a  most  useful 
and  faithful  pastor.  He  gave  himself  wholly  to  that 
work,  and  visited  the  unconverted  and  the  awakened 
with  great  assiduity  and  patience.  His  quick  insight, 
native  tact,  and  ready  sympathy,  made  his  way  to  the 
hearts  of  men  quite  easy.    But  beyond  this  general  view 

of  his  activity  in  those  awakening  days,  we  have  little 

8* 


178 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


data  for  a  fully  detailed  account.  Only  during  about  a 
fortnight,  in  February,  1858,  have  we  a  pretty  connected 
picture  of  his  share  in  that  great  religious  movement. 
Mrs.  Haven  had  gone  to  Amenia  the  first  of  that  month, 
on  account  of  a  serious  illness  under  which  her  mother 
was  suffering.  Letters  fly  to  and  fro  from  the  third  to 
the  seventeenth  of  the  month,  and  then  stop  ;  for  Mrs. 
Ingraham  had  died  of  typhoid  fever  on  the  eighteenth. 
She  was  very  composed  over  the  close  of  her  life.  She 
talked  much  about  her  husband,  the  children,  and  other 
friends,  who  had  preceded  her  into  that  realm  of  un- 
clouded day.  The  children  mourned  for  her  in  sadness, 
but  not  in  the  hopeless  way  of  heathen.  In  these  letters 
Church  news  occurs  mixed  up  with  all  sorts  of  chat 
about  home  and  friends.    On  February  4 

Dr.  Raymond  marched  in  and  filled  my  ears  and  study  with  argu- 
ments. He  gave  us  a  great  sermon  in  the  evening  ;  but,  like  most 
great  sermons,  it  didn't  do  the  execution  of  smaller  ones.  A  rifle 
brings  down  more  game  than  a  cannon.  Trafton  was  sick  and 
couldn't  come.  Thirty-one  joined  the  Church  Tuesday  night,  mak- 
ing, with  those  who  had  joined  before,  about  forty.  Ten  or  fifteen  were 
absent  who  will  join.  There  are  new  cases  every  night,  though  there 
was  more  of  a  lull  last  night  than  I  was  expecting. 

Yesterday,  the  7th,  I  preached  in  the  morning,  and  Brother  Charles 
Noble  in  the  afternoon.  There  was  a  great  crowd  all  day,  and  espe- 
cially in  the  evening.  A  number  of  new  cases  of  religious  interest. 
Monday  evening  I  preached  to  a  very  small  audience,  on  account  of 
very  small  notice,  given  as  they  were  mostly  gone  out  ;  but  we  had 
six  forward  for  prayers  ;  among  them,  the  Mrs.  Erskine  whose  fa- 
ther I  buried.  Her  husband  will  follow  to-morrow,  I  think.  Yesterday 
was  a  black  day  in  my  catalogue.  I  attended  funerals  from  ten  in 
the  morning  till  six  in  the  afternoon  ;  Louisa  Ladd  was  buried  in  the 


ROXBURV  AND  CaMBRIDGEPORT. 


morning,  and  Rev.  Mr.  Perkins,  of  Church  Street,  Boston,  in  the  aft- 
ernoon. The  church  was  draped  with  black,  and  filled  with  mourn- 
ers. The  services  were  long  and  very  solemn.  Brother  Crowell 
made  an  excellent  address,  and  Father  Taylor  said  some  of  his  best 
things.  We  buried  him  at  Woodlavvn.  Took  tea  at  Brother  Ma- 
gee's,  with  Brother  Rand  and  wife,  Mrs.  Page  and  daughter.  Father 
Merrill,  and  Mrs.  Jacob  Merrill.  We  had  a  goodly  meetmg  in  the 
evening,  and  a  number  were  at  the  altar.  The  feeling  does  not  seem 
to  grow,  though  new  cases  are  constantly  presenting  themselves. 
Mrs.  Erskine  and  her  cousin  were  forward  last  night. 

Some  days  later  the  pastor  reports  further: 

The  meetings  hold  out  full,  but  there  has  been  a  lull  since  Mon- 
day night.  Only  five  forward  last  night,  three  men  and  two  young 
women.  The  men  were  clear  cases  ;  one  of  them  Brother  R.'s  son. 
One  man  was  converted  Thursday  night  who  has  been  one  of  the 
w^orst  in  the  city,  so  bad  that  his  brother,  an  old  backslider,  said  : 

After  they  have  converted  him,  they  will  only  have  one  more  to 
convert,  and  that  is  the  devil."  He  seems  quite  changed,  penitent, 
and  prayerful,  though  he  has  been  a  great  ringleader  in  all  the  devil- 
tries, profanity,  and  drinking  at  the  Point.  Another,  a  rich  young 
man,  who  has  been  a  hard  drinker,  and  has  run  through  §20,000  in 
two  years,  they  say,  has  signed  the  pledge,  and  is  very  serious.  I 
called  on  him  Thursday  with  Brother  Goodhue,  and  he  and  his  wife 
appeared  thankful  for  the  visit.  W.  spoke  Thursday  night,  and  seems 
very  clear  and  firm.  This  has  broken  Y.  terribly,  and  I  shouldn't  be 
surprised  to  see  him  forward  Sunday  night.  We  are  expecting  that 
the  work  will  break  out  afresh  next  week,  under  Father  Merrill,  and 
gather  in  many  who  are  on  the  brink  of  decision.  Friday  night  we 
had  a  very  full  house,  a  good  sermon,  and  a  large  number  forward, 
Mr.  Erskine  following  his  wife  at  last.  Saturday  evening  the  meet- 
ing was  excellent.  There  were  five  new  inquirers,  besides  as  many 
old  ones,  and  yet  others  under  way.  The  Quarterly  Conference 
unanimously  requested  our  return  another  year  by  a  rising  vote. 


i8o 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


In  August,  1857,  Mr.  Haven  attended  camp-meeting 
at  Eastham,  and  sent  the  following  account  of  it  in  a 
letter  to  his  wife  and  child  :  " 

Darling  Molly  and  Willy  :  In  a  very  pleasant  tent,  under 
beautiful  trees,  with  Rev.  E.  O.  Haven  and  some  lay  dignitaries  at 
my  side,  and  a  lantern  dimly  burning  on  a  board,  such  are  the  sur- 
roundings of  your  venerable  husband  and  father.  With  talking 
going  on  as  fast  as  it  can,  I  suppose  you  will  not  expect  a  very  con- 
nected discourse,  but,  after  camp-meeting  style,  warm,  hearty  ex- 
hortation. I  wish  you  were  both  here,  taking  the  sea  baths,  hear- 
ing, seeing,  loafing  under  these  pleasant  little  trees,  and  having  a 
quiet  and  delicious  time.  We  had  a  delightful  sail  down.  The 
waves  were  quiet  and  the  moon  glorious  ;  the  crowd  was  good- 
natured,  scattered  around  on  the  decks  under  the  open  sky,  most  of 
them  without  sleep.  We  arrived  about  four  o'clock  in  the  morning, 
and  had  a  grand,  dancing  boat,  leaping  over  the  big  waves  on  which 
we  rolled  to  the  shore,  jumped  off  into  the  surf,  and  entered  the 
nicest  and  quietest  of  groves.  There  is  a  very  nice  company  here — 
Cousin  Otis,  Rev.  Daniel  Steele,  and  Rev.  W.  R.  Clark.  It  certainly 
is  the  most  perfect  spot  for  a  camp-meeting  I  ever  saw,  with  fresh 
sea  air,  magnificent  bathing  in  the  real  Atlantic  outside  Cape  Cod,  a 
grove  of  small  but  thickly  studded  oaks,  and  the  barrenest  sand  hills, 
with  salt  grass  and  scrub  oaks. 

Good-bye,  Gilbert. 

The  next  year  he  and  William  M.  Ingraham  took  a 
short  trip  to  the  White  Mountains,  and  he  cheered 
the  longing  heart  of  the  cherished  wife  with  a  letter 
telling  the  story  of  his  wanderings  : 

Flume  House,  Franconia  Notch. 

My  Dear  Molly  :  Sunday  night,  and  here  I  am  in  the  most 
glorious  place  I  ever  looked  on.  I  only  and  always  wish  you  were 
here  with  me.    But  that  cannot  be  except  internally,  and  so  I  see 


ROXBURV  AND  CaMBRIDGEPORT. 


i8r 


for  you  and  feel  for  you,  though  my  eyes  and  heart  ache  with  the 
work  that  is  set  them.  We  had  a  magnificent  day  and  drive  up  the 
Merrimack  Valley,  along  the  Pemigewasset,  and  got  to  the  end  of 
the  railroad  at  one  o'clock.  After  a  miserable  dinner,  we  got  aboard 
an  open  stage  and  rode  for  twenty-four  miles  through  a  delightful 
up  hill,  down  hill,  and  long  level  country,  getting  here  at  seven 
o'clock,  tired,  dusty,  and  delighted.  We  had  a  first-rate  supper,  and 
drank  our  fill  of  the  great  mountains  that  rise  up  before  the  door — 
Lafayette  and  Liberty — the  last  being  an  exact  profile  of  Washing- 
ton lying  in  state,  the  ridges  of  the  mountain  making  up  the  features 
in  a  very  distinct  manner.  This  morning  I  took  a  book  of  poetry 
from  the  table,  and  alone  climbed  Pemigewasset,  a  fine  hill,  about 
as  high  as  two  Holyoakes,  rising  beyond  this  house.  I  sauntered  up 
solitary  and  alone,  sitting  on  the  old  trees  to  read  some  fine  passages 
of  religious  poetry,  inspired  by  nature,  and  to  gaze  my  soul  full  of 
the  same  sort  spread  out  around  me.  So  I  got  to  the  top,  and  my 
heart  almost  came  out  of  my  mouth.  What  a  scene  !  I  am  not  a 
painter,  or  I  would  give  a  sketch  of  it  with  this  crayon  on  the  rest 
of  this  page.  I  might  as  well  undertake  to  tell  it  so  as  to  do  it  in 
words.  L.  would  do  it  if  she  were  here,  but  she  isn't,  thank  for- 
tune !  Fifty  miles  down  the  valley  roll  the  mountains,  and  between 
them  glitters  the  silver  thread  of  the  Pemigewasset,  chief  source  of 
the  Merrimack.  On  the  east,  out  of  a  sea  of  pines,  rise  the  sover- 
eign heads  of  Liberty  and  Lafayette,  one  vast  forest,  without  a  sign 
of  a  house  or  a  human  being,  topped  with  these  crags.  On  the  west 
there  sinks  a  precipice  thousands  of  feet,  and  at  its  base  and  up  the 
sides  of  other  mountains  beyond  rises  another  ocean  of  pines. 

It  was  overwhelming.  Wordsworth  can  only  tell  a  little  of  it,  and 
he  is  not  here  to  be  quoted.  I  \vas  there  about  a  half  an  hour  and 
then  came  down. 

We  went  to  church  and  heard  Dr.  Thompson,  of  Salem,  preach  a 
good  sermon.  I  did  the  singing,  with  many  compliments  from  the 
crowd.  In  the  afternoon  Thomas  Starr  King  preached.  I  sat  in 
the  pulpit,  started  the  hymns,  and  made  the  prayer.  Is  not  that  as 
surprising  as  the  mountains  !    Well,  that  isn't  the  end  of  it.  After 


l82 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


singing  and  preacliing  he  and  I  and  William  walked  up  the  mount- 
ain together,  and  saw  the  sun  set  on  those  hills.  This  evening  serv- 
ice was  better  than  the  morning,  for  the  sun  was  shining,  while  in 
■the  morning  it  was  cloudy,  and  sometimes  foggy.  Wordsworth  is 
needed  here  also.  Please  look  him  up  and  read  the  appropriate 
passages.  If  he  isn't  handy,  take  the  Bible,  infinitely  better,  and 
about  as  unknown,  and  read  the  passages  in  the  Psalms  and  Isaiah, 
Job  and  Revelation,  which  speak  of  the  White  Mountains.  You 
will  tind  lots  of  'em  if  you  know  where  they  are. 

Meanwhile  we  had  drifted  into  controversy,  and  came  down  fight- 
ing on  theology.  After  supper  we  sat  down  in  the  hall  (he  and  his 
wife,  William  and  I)  and  went  at  it.  We  talked  "  like  brave  men, 
long  and  well,"  for  about  two  hours.  All  the  boarders  piling  up 
around  us  to  hear,  I  had  liberty,  and  preached  the  Gospel  to  a  great 
many  ears  that  never  heard  it  before.  He  is  the  petted,  brilliant, 
and  famous  Starr  King,  and  I  an  unknown  Methodist  preacher ;  yet 
they  owned  after  we  got  through  that  he  didn't  whip  me,  Unitarians, 
Universalists,  and  all.  I  gave  him  some  good  hits,  but  I  don't  think 
he  fairly  floored  me  once.  One  hit  was  especially  good.  He  was 
boasting  of  the  Unitarian  liberality  in  general  matters,  educational 
and  philanthropic.  I  told  him  Unitarianism  and  Methodism  started 
together  here— Unitarianism  with  all  the  money,  and  Methodism 
going  into  the  woods  and  mountains  like  these,  and  picking  up  the 
poor.  Yet  they  had  only  one  college  besides  Harvard,  and  that  al- 
most bankrupt ;  while  we  had  about  twenty,  and  about  forty  schools. 
It  shut  him  up  quick,  and  gave  me  a  fine  chance  to  expand  on 
Methodism  before  a  lot  of  big  fellows  who  know  nothing  about  it. 
So  we  had  it  out,  and  I  preached  my  sermon  to  a  very  attentive  au- 
dience.   May  the  Lord  bless  it  to  the  salvation  of  their  souls ! 

Monday  Morm'jtg. — After  a  restless  night,  caused  by  the  climb- 
ing and  the  discussion,  I  arose  at  five  o'clock  and  walked  to  the 
Flume.  It  was  delightful  there  in  the  cool,  calm,  coming  morn.  I 
looked  down  the  valley  from  this  house,  and  while  we  and  those 
miles  below  us  lay  in  deep  shade,  beyond  that  for  twenty  or  thirty 
miles  the  mountains  were  all  up  and  laughing  in  the  sun.    We  are 


ROXBURY  AND  CAMBRIDGEPORT. 


183 


off  for  Lafayette,  an  eight  or  ten  mile  jaunt,  the  last  three  up  rough, 
precipitous  rocks.  Emerson's  verses  have  been  running  in  my  ears 
all  the  morning  : 

"  Full  tenderly  the  royal  day 

Fills  his  blue  urn  with  fire  ; 
One  morn  is  in  the  mighty  sky, 

And  one  in  our  desire." 

When  we  reach  the  top  of  Lafayette,  Washington's  first  lieu- 
tenant, I  expect  both  heavens  will  meet.  The  mail  is  closing. 
Kisses  for  you  and  the  babies. 

Gilbert. 

Always  a  man  of  very  domestic  tastes,  and  extremely 
happy  in  his  home,  Mr.  Haven  was  during  these 
crowded  and  fugitive  years  at  the  culmination  of  his 
fireside  and  family  bHss.  It  is  not  easy  to  paint  the 
difference  between  this  stage  of  his  Hfe  and  earlier  ones, 
though  one  feels  it  in  the  entire  tone  and  spirit  of  these 
few  letters.  Before  marriage  there  had  been  an  inces- 
sant sense  of  want  and  incompleteness.  Never  had  he 
reached  a  point  where  he  was  ready  to  say  to  that  mo- 
ment, "  Stay,  thou  art  so  fair  ! "  But  these  letters  show 
a  heart  content  with  its  affections  while  wife  and  child 
are  at  home  ;  full  of  unspeakable  longings  when  ab- 
sences occur,  but  yet  of  smiling  longings,  because  all 
such  absences  are  swiftly  to  terminate  in  renewed  so- 
ciety. If  it  were  possible,  we  should  be  glad  to  make 
our  sketch  of  this  happy-hearted  period  a  little  later, 
after  the  birth  of  the  daughter,  Mary  Michelle,  May  7, 
1858  ;  but  no  correspondence  of  any  extent  between 
Gilbert  and  Mary  Haven  is  to  be  found  of  that  date. 
It  is  his  pen  which  here  gives  most  of  the  details  of  the 


Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 


picture,  partly  because  he  and  the  boy  are  at  home,  so 
that  news  from  them  must  be  furnished  the  absent  wife 
and  mother,  and  partly  because  the  latter  is  so  busy 
with  the  offices  of  love  and  duty  for  her  own  dying 
mother.  Mrs.  Haven's  letters  are  mainly  given  up  to 
details  of  her  mother's  condition.  Yet  they  reveal  in 
every  line  the  perfect  peace  and  confidence  which  are 
only  found  in  homes  where  Love  ever  maintains  his  su- 
preme authority,  and  is  strengthened  with  the  growth 
of  wedded  souls.  Brief  and  preoccupied  as  they  are, 
they  are  brightened  up  with  little  touches  of  wifely  and 
maternal  tenderness,  which  tell  their  own  story  of  per- 
fect content  and  happiness. 

The  boy  had  never  been  separated  from  his  mother 
so  long  before,  and  much  of  the  correspondence  turns 
upon  him.    February  3  Mrs.  Haven  writes : 

I  am  glad  you  and  Willy  are  so  happy  in  my  absence.  I  knew 
you  could'  drive  away  all  loneliness  with  meetings,  books,  and 
prayers,  and  I  hardly  believed  Willy  would  grieve  away  much  of  his 
fat  or  fun,  hard  as  it  was  for  me  to  leave  him.  I  haven't  any  anx- 
iety about  Willy,  but  I  am  almost  lost  without  him.  His  little  heart 
clings  close  to  mine,  and  is  almost  as  much  one  v^-ith  it  as  his  fa- 
ther's. Don't  let  him  lack  for  care,  and  tell  Anna  [the  servant]  to 
have  patience  with  his  wants  and  willfulness.  She  must  watch  his 
hands  and  feet  that  he  may  not  take  cold  in  the  changes  of  the 
weather. 

The  father  responds  the  next  day: 

I  suppose  you  are  ready  to  receive  a  message  from  the  Roxbury 
poorhouse.  Willy  waked  up  this  morning,  reared  up  like  a  fox,  and 
asked,  "Where's  mamma?  where's  mamma?"    Echo  answered, 


ROXBURY  AND  CaMBRIDGEPORT.  185 


"  Where  ?  "  He  came  to  his  memory,  and  said,  "  Gone  to  grand- 
ma ;  grandma  sick  bed."  Here  he  comes  now  trotting  through  the 
entry  and  crying,  "  Breakfast  is  ready !  "  running  'way  up  to  the  cham- 
ber in  the  excess  of  his  zeal  to  carry  the  glad  tidings.  .  .  .  Willy  is 
playing  with  his  truck  on  the  floor,  and  I  shall  take  him  down  to  the 
post-office  with  me,  as  it  is  very  sunshiny  and  mild.  Love  of  the 
loveliest  kind  from  Willy,  chattering  on  Anna's  lap  as  she  is  putting 
on  his  coat. 

Willy  is  as  chipper  as  a  spring  robin  when  awake.  He  is  sleeping 
very  sound  just  now,  like  Zip  Coon,  whom  you  have  heard  me  speak 
of  in  my  melodious  notes.  He  grows  in  looks  and  talk,  so  that  I 
guess  you  would  hardly  know  him.  I  find  him  a  great  deal  of  com- 
pany nights,  and  see  now  what  makes  you  so  contented  when  I  am 
away.  Last  night  he  woke  up  when  I  went  to  bed,  and  lay  awake 
about  an  hour,  telling  the  adventures  of  the  day,  interspersed  with 
pulling  hair  and  counting  his  toes.  He  counts  up  to  ten  with  con- 
siderable success.  .  .  .  Have  no  anxieties  about  his  catching  cold 
or  the  mumps  or  something  or  other.  Doubtless  you  long  to  hear 
him  chatter  and  crow  as  he  did  last  night  just  before  I  wenfto 
meeting,  when  he  had  a  gale,  interspersing  it,  like  a  true  Methodist, 
with  prayers,  crying  out,  and  getting  down  on  his  knees.  He  is  not 
entirely  forgetful  of  mamma,  setting  her  chair,  and  fixing  her  pillow 
for  her,  but  unless  you  come  soon  he  will  let  you  slide  out  of  his 
memory.  .  .  .  Willy  is  as  crazy  as  he  can  be  this  morning.  He 
sends  his  love.  I  just  tried  to  make  him  send  you  a  kiss  by  me,  but 
he  refused.  Now  he  repents,  sends  you  a  half  dozen  through  my 
lips,  and  keeps  his  going  in  sign  of  ceaseless  love.  Mine  are  in- 
cluded in  his. 

The  pretty  mother's  answer  shows  that  she  knows 
what  to  think  about  all  that : 

Good-morning  to  each  of  you.  You,  my  boy,  Willy,  are  just  about 
popping  up  to  see  the  daylight,  and  pull  papa's  hair,  till  he  finds  your 
stockings,  and  begins  to  make  a  stir  generally,  wishing  all  the  while 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


you  would  lie 'down  and  go  to  sleep.  .  .  .  What  shall  I  say  to  you, 
Willy  ?  I  can't  begin  to  tell  you  how  much  I  want  to  get  you  into 
my  arms,  and  hear  your  little  prattle,  prattle.  It  will  sound  very 
sweet  to  my  ears.  Papa  thinks  I  may  not  know  you,  you  are  getting 
to  be  such  a  wonderful  boy.  But  we  will  see  when  I  get  there.  My 
heart  is  full,  but  it  cannot  find  expression  on  paper.  You  spealr'of  ~ — 
'  Willy  going  out  on  Monday.  It  was  cold  and  windy  here.  Be  care- 
ful and  don't  expose  him  too  much,  and  bundle  him  up,  so  that  he 
will  not  take  cold. 

To  all  which  maternal  and  wifely  admonitions  the 
merry-hearted  father  replies  in  the  last  letters: 

You  needn't  worry  about  Willy  a  mite,  much  as  you  may,  because 
you  cannot  see  him.  He  never  looked  so  well  in  his  life,  and  bears 
the  cold  like  an  Esquimo.  I  took  him  to  the  post-ofiice  yesterday. 
He  kept  saying  "cold  water,"  as  a  sign  of  the  feeling  of  his  face,  but 
wouldn't  come  in  when  I  got  home.  He  had  to  be  run  up  and  down 
the  yard  a  good  many  times,  and  then  sat  in  the  shed  some  twenty 
minutes,  while  1  manipulated  the  wood,  protesting  against  coming 
into  the  house. 

Mr.  William  and  his  handmaid  went  yesterday  to  call  on  the  Hon. 
Josiah  Quincy,  at  No.  4  Park  Street.  He  offered  his  honor  a  demi- 
john with  which  he  was  enjoying  himself  when  the  old  gentleman 
appeared  at  the  door.  Anna  and  the  other  maid-servants  had  a 
great  laugh,  and  perhaps  a  great  mortification  also,  over  the  free- 
and-easiness  of  the  young  prince. 

These  pictures  of  the  charm  and  merriment  introduced 
into  their  home-life  by  the  darling  son,  thrown  off  in 
such  easy  and  life-like  touches,  show  how  his  mind  and 
heart  opened  to  their  enchantments.  No  sense  of  in- 
completeness about  these  joys  save  what  would  disap- 
pear as  soon  as  Mary  should  come  home  again.    It  is 


ROXBURY  AND  CaMBRIDGEPORT.  1 8/ 

noticeable  how  restless  and  uneasy  he  always  was  when 
she  was  away  from  home.  When  she  left  him  for  short 
visits  at  Northampton  and  Wilbraham,  he  was  wont  to 
tell  her  over  and  over  again  how  very  well  he  was 
getting  on  without  her,  and  how  needless  it  was 
that  she  should  shorten  her  stay  on  his  account.  Yet 
the  letters  showed  by  the  proceedings  they  recorded 
that  he  was  as  uneasy  as  Tantalus  in  his  pain.  Any 
thing  was  welcome  that  would  take  him  away  from  home 
for  a  little  time,  were  it  only  to  dinner-  or  tea,  and  so 
break  up  his  unrelieved  solitude.  Calls  to  go  out  away 
from  home  were  welcome,  especially  if  they  took  him 
out  of  town  upon  some  plausible  employment.  Some- 
times he  lets  his  troubles  slip  out  when  he  supposes  he 
is  hiding  them. 

I  should  like  to  fill  up  this  space  with  the  feelings  which  stir  with- 
in me.  Perhaps  you  also  would  that  you  might  thus  be  rid  of  yours. 
I  don't  see  any  great  comfort  in  going  through  these  agonies  ;  hug- 
ging and  kissing  are  a  vanitas  vanitatum.  I  must  crowd  the 
loves  all  back  again  into  the  hold  and  seal  the  hatchways.  I  can 
stand  it  as  long  as  you  can,  as  the  darkey  said  to  his  aching  foot. 
And  you  can  stand  it  as  long  as  duty  says  so.  And  there  we  will 
leave  it,  waiting  for  the  good  time  that  is  near  at  hand,  and  not 
afar  off. 

But  he  had  moods  when  he  tried  to  reveal  the  in- 
ternal flames  of  love,  though  he  generally  concluded 
that  it  was  impossible. 

I  have  Just  benedictioned  the  congregation,  and  now  I  will  you.  Tt 
is  not  unlikely  that  you  are  scribbling  away  to  me  with  an  aching 
side,  while  I  am  driving  at  you  with  an  aching  heart.    I  should  like 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


to  see  you  for  about  five  minutes,  and  have  an  old  courting  spell 
while  the  folks  were  totally  unconscious  that  such  heavenly  feasts 
were  being  enjoyed  so  near  them.  How  little  we  must  know  of  the 
higher  beings  and  their  loves  when  we  are  so  ignorant  of  the  feelings 
of  those  right  about  us.  Sally  knows  nothing  of  the  fire  consuming 
your  soul,  and  Willy  is  in  like  blissful  ignorance  of  mine.  ...  I  had 
better  leave  this  page  a  blank  to  express  the  inexpressible.  .  .  . 
There  are  subjects  I  could  once  talk  about,  that  have  got  beyond  my 
depth  now.  It  is  foolish  for  those  in  mid-ocean  to  be  talking  about 
the  water  all  the  time.  It  will  do  before  they  start,  and  when  they 
are  going  out  of  the  harbor ;  but  it  soon  gets  to  be  too  big  a  subject 
for  them.  So  of  the  subject.  It  must  be  left  unsaid  and  unsung. 
We  all  love  you  as  much  as  you  know  and  reciprocate. 

Alluding  to  this  remark  a  little  later  the  affectionate 
wife  says : 

The  old  Valley  hasn't  lost  all  its  charms  with  the  loss  of  its  green 
leaves  and  grass.  It  is  the  first  time  I  have  seen  it  in  winter  since  I 
used  to  listen  for  your  footsteps  and  feel  the  heart  throb  at  their  ap- 
proach. You  may  chide  my  affections  as  encroaching  on  your  place. 
I  know  they  have  grown  with  my  growth  in  years,  and  strengthened 
with  my  uueakness.  I  can't  stay  for  courting  now.  It  is  three 
o'clock  in  the  morning.  I  have  been  up  with  Ma,  and  must  lie 
down. 

Mrs.  Haven  was  probably  sleepy  from  her  long  vigil 
when  she  wrote  these  lines,  for  she  has  here  slipped  into 
the  only  ambiguity  that  she  is  guilty  of  in  the  corre- 
spondence. But  perhaps  a  little  help  will  show  us  just 
what  thought  half  shaped  itself  in  her  drowsy  but  loving 
brains.  She  had  gone  forth  from  that  happy  Valley  to 
wander  over  the  face  of  the  New  England  Conference 
with  her  husband,  until  she  had  grown  almost  a  stranger 


ROXBURY  AND  CaMBRIDGEPORT.  1 89 

to  the  home  of  her  youth.  Some  day  she  had  expressed 
her  yearning  to  look  upon  the  old  familiar  scene  more 
frequently,  and  he  had  told  her  that,  after  all,  it  was  but 
the  common  lot  of  her  kind.  For  a  husband's  sake,  they 
forsake  father  and  mother,  and  often  the  early  home  as 
well,  to  cleave  unto  him.  When  the  summons  for  this 
winter  visit  came,  the  husband  had  tried  to  brighten 
the  prospect  by  saying :  "  Now  you  will  see  the  happy 
Valley  again,  and  can  get  on  without  your  husband,  who 
cannot  leave  the  revival  work.  Pity  that  you  should  see 
the  Valley  stripped  of  its  green  leaves  and  grass."  The 
exiled  wife  lets  him  know,  that  he  may  not  be  too  anx- 
ious about  her,  that  the  Valley  itself  has  a  charm  for  her 
eyes  even  in  winter,  and  that  it  has  a  higher  and  highest 
charm  as  the  happy  custodian  of  the  spot  where  "  I 
used  to  listen  for  your  footsteps,  and  feel  the  heart  throb 
at  their  approach."  "  You  may  chide  my  affections  [for 
Amenian  scenes  and  friends]  as  encroaching  on  your 
place "  in  my  affections.  But  they  [my  affections  for 
you]  have  grown  with  my  growth  in  years,  and  strength- 
ened with  my  weakness."  Doubtless  this  was  sleepy 
Mary's  thought,  though  only  half  expressed  ;  and  a  very 
pretty  letter  it  was  to  send  home  to  the  patient  husband. 
It  is  worth  observing,  likewise,  that  her  heart  is  broad 
awake  in  spite  of  the  sleepy  brain.  What  else  could 
have  dictated  that  delicious  sentence  :  It  is  the  first 
time  I  have  seen  it  in  winter  since  /  zised  to  listen  for 
your  footsteps^  and  feel  the  heart  throb  at  their  approach. 

This  letter  was  sure  to  touch  her  husband,  as  his 
answer  shows : 


igo  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

You  got  upon  a  strain  which  made  me  feel  a  little  conscience- 
stricken,  not  to  say  a  good  deal,  when  yoa  refer  to  my  gentle  chid- 
ings,  and  your  growth  in  weakness.  I  often  think  I  am  not  mindful 
enough  of  that  increasing  weakness.  It  don't  seem  possible  that 
you  are  not  full  of  health  and  strength,  though  I  know  so  well  the 
contrary.  And  I  look  forward  with  more  fears  than  I  dare  express 
to  myself.  Ah,  Molly,  spite  of  all,  our  love  is,  as  I  said  in  my 
last,  an  ocean — the  ver\'  midst  of  its  measureless  breadth  smd 
depth  now,  to  its  shores  and  harbors  then.  Deep  and  glorious 
as  it  was  in  those  winter  days  seven  years  ago,  and  more  glorious 
as  it  was  in  those  winter  days  at  Northampton,  both  were  shallows 
to  the  present. 

Turning  back  to  those  Northampton  w  inter  days,  we 
find  this  record,  under  date  of  one  of  them:  "Six 
months  ago  I  entered  that  holy  estate  from  which  I  hope 
never  to  be  released,  and  which,  I  pray,  may  not  by  the 
hand  of  death  be  long  interrupted."  Never  was  a  sin- 
cerer  prayer  uttered.  With  increased  fervor  did  he  pour 
out  his  supplications  at  this  high  flood  of  his  married 
joys,  that  it  might  please  God  to  make  them  one  in  life 
and  one  in  death,  now  that  his  wife's  health  was  serious- 
ly threatened.  What  the  most  anxious  care  and  love 
could  do  was  jealously  done.  But  the  general  tone  of 
Mrs.  Haven's  health  was  not  by  far  so  vigorous  as  it  had 
been.  Yet  she  seemed  well  and  strong.  Her  spirits 
were  high  and  her  courage  even  higher.  During  the 
winter  of  1859-60  she  was  a  good  deal  ill,  and  lost 
something  of  her  spirits  and  a  great  deal  of  her  courage. 
No  contemporaneous  account  of  the  closing  scenes  of 
her  life  from  her  husband's  pen  have  come  into  my  hands. 
Six  years  later  we  find  this  statement: 


ROXBURY  AND  CaMBRIDGEPORT. 


191 


Sunday,  March  25,  1866. 

Six  years  to-night  my  dear  wife  sat  in  the  rocking-chair  beside  my 
study  table,  and  engaged  in  the  last  family  prayers  we  ever  had  to- 
gether. I  preached  that  night  a  charity  sermon  in  the  Prospect 
Street  Congregational  Church,  at  Cambridgeport.  I  read  her  the 
discourse.  We  talked  very  cheerfully.  She  was  bright,  smiling, 
happy,  but  weak.  At  prayers  she  sang  for  the  last  time  in  the  body. 
I  have  thought  many,  many  times,  how  fitting  was  that  hymn.  How 
little  I  thought  we  should  both  be  brought  to  test  it,  though  in  dif- 
ferent ways.    It  was  this  : 

"  Father,  whate'er  of  earthly  bliss 

Thy  sovereign  will  denies, 
Accepted  at  the  throne  of  grace 

Let  my  petitions  rise. 

"  Give  me  a  calm  and  thankful  heart. 

From  every  murmur  free. 
The  blessings  of  thy  grace  impart. 

And  let  me  live  to  thee  ! 

"  Still  may  the  hope  that  thou  art  mine, 

My  life  and  death  attend  ; 
Thy  presence  through  my  journey  shine 

And  crown  my  journey's  end." 

She  has  proved  the  last  verse  and  I  the  first.  I  hear  that  voice 
now,  and  the  vacant  chair  standing  in  just  the  same  relation  to  this 
table  as  that  did  makes  it  live  all  the  more.  The  next  Thursday  she 
was  confined  about  nine  o'clock  in  the  morning ;  Friday  night  she 
was  attacked  with  a  fever ;  and  Tuesday  noon  "  His  presence  crowned 
her  journey's  end  "  with  glory  unspeakable  and  eternal. 


192 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  XI. 

MARY    IN  HEAVEN. 

Gilbert  and  Mary  Haven-The  Happy  Past-Present  Desolation-Response  to  Sym- 
pathy— Chaplain  Haven— A  Blue  Letter— Shyness  of  his  Grief— The  Memorial  Days- 
Artistic  and  Real  Sorrow  Contrasted— Consolation. 

IT  would  be  safe  to  challenge  persons  who  have  read 
many  biographies  and  been  familiar  with  the  interior 
life  of  many  individuals,  to  produce  a  happier  one  than 
Mr.  Haven's  had  been  up  to  the  death  of  his  wife.  His 
remarkable  faculty  for  overlooking  the  petty  vexations 
which  infest  and  poison  almost  every  position,  of  making 
the  utmost  of  the  friends  about  him,  and  for  stealing 
some  holiday  joy  out  of  the  dullest  round  of  homely 
duties,  had  rendered  his  life  a  scene  of  various  enjoy- 
ment. Nobody  could  have  known  him  in  those  days 
without  a  perception  that  he  had  a  sunny  nature,  and 
that  this  world  had,  in  the  main,  shown  him  scenes  of 
unusual  happiness.  A  perusal  of  his  letters  and  jour- 
^  nals  would  abundantly  confirm  this  idea.  It  might  strike 
many  a  reader  that  Mr.  Haven  had  not  been  favored 
with  so  remarkable  a  profusion  of  earthly  gifts  and  oppor- 
tunities as  many  people,  but  it  would  be  plain  that  he 
had  the  enchanter's  skill  of  making  the  earth  blossom 
beneath  his  feet  and  the  happy  air  vocal  around  him. 

To  those  who  knew  him  only  outwardly,  it  would 
seem  that  nothing  so  very  unusual  had  befallen  him 


Mary  in  Heaven.  193 

when  he  buried  his  beloved  Mary  out  of  his  sight.  He 
had  lost  many  a  friend  before.  His  first-born  son, 
George,  and  his  sisters,  Bethiah  and  Anna,  had  been 
very  dear  to  him  ;  and  so  had  been  Miss  Emily  Hunt, 
Mr.  George  Ingraham,  and  his  father-in-law  Ingraham. 
Yet  these  had  been  taken  one  after  another.  It  was  but 
one  friend  more  who  had  passed  on  into  the  celestial 
city.  It  was,  of  course,  a  nearer  friend  than  any  other, 
the  wife  of  his  youth,  that  had  now  been  summoned 
from  his  side.  Certainly  he  had  loved  her  very  fondly, 
and  midnight  gloom  had  settled  down  upon  his  path- 
way on  her  removal ;  but  such  fortune  is  only  the  com- 
mon lot,  and  the  only  wisdom  would  be  to  wait  for  the 
healing  touches  of  time  upon  his  wounded  heart.  Of 
course,  he  went  about  with  a  sad  dejection  upon  his 
soul,  and  his  face  as  well.  He  was  silent,  and  abstracted, 
and  seemed  in  his  sorrow  set  off  from  any  rash  intrusions 
of  sympathy.  Yet,  after  a  while,  he  began  to  talk  again, 
and,  save  that  an  air  of  grief  was  upon  all  that  he  did, 
his  talk  had  all  its  old  dash  and  fire  and  charm. 

Certain  of  his  intimate  friends  saw  much  more  clearly 
than  others  how  fearful  the  shock  had  been,  and  they 
sought  to  comfort  him  by  letters  of  the  most  delicate 
sympathy.  They  devised  various  plans  to  take  him 
away  from  home,  and  so  break  in  upon  the  gloomy  cur- 
rent of  sad  thoughts  that  haunted  his  solitude.  He  re- 
sponded in  a  hopeless  way,  and  tried  distraction  of 
thought  through  little  trips  and  excursions,  only  to  find 
his  heart  bleeding  the  worse  for  the  brave  effort  to  over- 
come his  grief.  He  answered  the  letters  in  the  same 
0 


194 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


temper,  and  several  of  the  responses  are  in  almost  the 
same  words.  To  one  very  dear  and  helpful  friend,  Rev. 
William  Rice,  D.D.,  he  replied  in  the  following  letter: 

Cambridge,  May  n,  i860. 

Dear  Brother  Rice  :  You  have,  doubtless,  excused  my  silence. 
I  am  in  no  mood  to  write  now,  but  feel  that  I  ought  sometime  to 
acknowledge  your  very  excellent  and  beneficial  word  of  sympathy. 
I  sink  in  deep  waters.  "  All  thy  waves  and  thy  billows  go  over  me." 
I  feel  no  relief,  though  I  know  and  hourly  feel  how  blessed  is  her 
condition,  with  what  infinite  calm  of  infinite  affection  she  awaits  the 
hour  of  my  coming;  yet  I  feel  the  power  of  the  human,  the  temporal. 
It  seems  to  increase  rather  than  decrease.  O,  what  a  terrible  ex- 
perience !  May  God  long  preserve  you  or  Kate  from  passing  into  it. 
There  is  no  passing  through  it,  till  we  pass  through  the  gates  into 
the  city.  Fales  and  I  are  talking  of  going  to  Niagara  and  Washir;g- 
ton.  I  don't  know  that  I  shall  go.  I  can  do  nothing  here.  It  may 
be  a  slight  relief  to  go  away  for  a  season,  though  I  have  no  confi- 
dence in  the  medicine.  If  we  go,  I  may  call  and  see  you  on  my  way 
back.    Remember  me  to  your  wife.  Yours  truly, 

G.  Haven. 

There  were  no  friends  who  stood  closer  to  him  at  that 
time  than  these,  and  they  saw  that  they  could  not  con- 
sole him.  None  of  them  had  ever  passed  through  that 
consecration  of  like  sorrow  which  gives  high  and  noble 
natures  the  deep,  subtle  insight  into  the  woes  of  the 
bereft,  which  alone  has  the  talismanic  power  to  beguile 
somewhat  the  keenness  of  griefs  instinctively  recognized 
as  incurable.  He  did  not  reject  any  offices  of  kindness 
or  repel  the  attentions  which  expressed  the  earnest 
desire  to  mitigate  his  agony.  Once  or  twice  he  ex- 
plained to  friends  whose  counsels  he  did  not  follow, 


Mary  in  Heaven.  195 

that  they  did  not  comprehend  the  matter,  and  that  a 
similar  bereavement  alone  could  make  them  wiser.  He 
made  no  record  whatever  in  his  Journal  for  many  months 
after  this  event.  Apparently  he  could  not  bear  to  refer 
to  the  subject  more  than  was  unavoidable.  He  went 
about  his  parish  work  as  well  as  he  could  with  a  broken 
heart.  But  his  iron  constitution  yielded  to  the  terrible 
strain.  In  the  winter  of  1860-61  he  was  seriously  ill, 
and  so  forbidding  was  the  outlook  at  the  next  session 
of  the  New  England  Conference,  that  he  was  left  with- 
out regular  work.  Then  came  the  war.  He  thought  it 
possible  that  he  might  find  some  relief  in  the  diversified 
scenes  of  camp  life.  He  offered  his  services  as  chaplain 
to  Governor  Andrew,  was  sworn  in,  and  spent  a  night 
before  starting  for  Washington  with  his  regiment  in 
Fancuil  Hall.  There  he  wrote  a  letter  for  his  friends  at 
home  and  gave  it  to  Lieutenant  Degan,  of  Lynn,  to  be 
forwarded  to  its  destination  in  case  he  should  not  return 
home.  Through  some  mistake  the  letter  was  at  once 
sent  to  Maiden,  where  it  made  a  pretty  somber  im- 
pression. His  sister,  Miss  Hannah  Haven,  replied. 
His  response  to  her  gives  some  striking  glimpses  of  his 
usual  moods : 

You  mistake  in  calling  that  a  black  letter.  It  was  very  solemn  in 
its  tone,  I  know,  because  it  was  written  with  the  possible  future  clearly 
before  me.  But  I  was  conscious  of  great  lightness  of  heart  in  writ- 
ing it,  and,  when  it  was  done,  went  back  and  lay  on  my  mattress 
as  cheerful  as  ever  I  had  been  :  much  more  so  than  I  have  been  any 
time  this  year.  Letters  that  speak  about  the  possibility  of  dying  in 
this  service  are  not  gloomy  to  me.  I  have  walked  in  the  valley  of  the 
shadow  of  death  for  more  than  a  year,  every  waking  hour  and  almost 


196 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


every  waking  moment ;  and  I  am  enabled  to  say,  "  I  fear  no  evil." 
It  is  the  passage  to  my  home,  and  though  not  pleasant  to  the  feelings 
as  a  passage,  the  intense,  immeasurable,  unspeakable  pressure  of 
heart  to  reach  that  home  makes  me  almost  unmindful  of  the  path 
that  leads  to  it.  I  may,  perhaps,  long  to  be  with  my  wife  as  much 
as  with  Jesus.  I  cannot  argue,  cannot  give  reasons  for  this  state. 
I  can  only  say  that  it  exists,  and  it  exists  not  only  without  the  disap- 
proval of  my  conscience,  but  with  its  hearty  and  constant  approval. 
I  know  that  I  love  my  Saviour  supremely.  Without  him  the  other 
loves  that  bloom  in  the  heart  would  wither  and  die.  But  1  also  know 
that  these  relations  of  soul  with  soul  are  ordained  of  God,  blessed  of 
God,  and  perpetuated  of  God.    For  me  the  bitterness  of  death  is  past. 

Wc  may,  perhaps,  regard  the  mistake  that  sent  his 
letter  home  as  providential,  in  view  of  the  graphic  state- 
ment of  his  views  and  sentiments  given  in  the  ansvv^er. 
He  never  mentioned  his  wife  in  the  pulpit  in  any  direct 
or  even  veiled  way.  He  had  more  than  once  heard 
such  things  carried  to  an  extravagant  excess  which  of- 
fended and  shocked  his  finer  sensibih'ties.  He  had 
written  after  such  a  performance  to  his  Mary : 

  preached  a  rousing  sermon  for  me  in  the  afternoon,  which 

swept  them  like  a  tornado — full  of  strong,  round  voice,  easy  postures, 
fair  sense,  and  exceedingly  pathetic  stories.  As  usual  with  twice- 
marriedites,  he  piled  up  the  agony  over  his  first  wife  and  his  sorrow 
at  losing  her.  What  a  power  of  delivery  I  shall  have  when  I  get  my 
second  wife  !  I  am  afraid  I  shall  not  make  much  of  a  pulpit  orator 
till  that  dreadful  bereavement  and  blessed  cure  come  along.  No 
such  tremendous  sermon  has  been  preached  in  our  house  since  I 
have  been  here,  unless  Dr.  Raymond  did  it. 

Apart  from  his  disgust  at  such  questionable  proceed- 
ings, his  constantly  living  sorrow  would  not  permit  him 


Mary  in  Heaven.  197 

to  allude  to  his  wife  under  penalty  of  breaking  down 
into  sobs  and  tears. 

The  same  modesty  kept  him  from  any  display  over 
her  in  print.    Proudly  as  Lowell  himself  he  could  say: 

"  I  come  not  of  the  race 
That  hawk  their  sorrows  in  the  market-place; 
Earth  stops  the  ears  I  best  had  loved  to  please." 

It  is  even  remarkable,  in  view  of  the  broken  heart  he 
carried  abroad  on  his  trip  to  Europe  and  the  East,  how 
carefully  he  kept  all  such  allusions  under  control  in  his 
letters.  The  Pilgrim's  Wallet  "  shows,  perhaps,  three 
passages  which  might  suggest  to  friends  only  that  he 
was  thinking  of  his  beloved  Mary.  Near  Tennyson's 
»      house,  in  the  Isle  of  Wight,  he  wrote  : 

I  regretted  that  I  could  not  climb  and  see 

"  The  stately  ships  go  on 

To  their  haven  under  the  hill." 

But  without  the  sight  and  sound  of  the  steady  beating  of  the  sea 
upon  the  crags,  the  pathos  of  the  moaning  conclusion  echoed  in  the 
soul ;  a  pathos  which  no  other  poet  equals  except  Wordsworth,  and 
he  in  but  one  line — the  saddest  in  poetry : 

"  But  she  is  in  her  grave,  and  O  ! 
The  difference  to  me." 

So  was  it,  too,  at  the  house  of  Robert  Browning,  like 
himself,  a  widower : 

The  house  seemed  vacant.  Her  picture  is  on  the  wall.  Yet  one 
looks  for  the  living  presence  of  this  greatest  among  women,  but  looks 
in  vain.  Other  pictures  and  minor  works  of  art  make  the  room 
homeUke,  though  not  truly  homelike.    What  a  sad,  perhaps  uncon- 


198  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


scious,  presentiment  of  this  hour  ran  through  the  Hnes  of  that  ten- 
derest  and  deepest  of  conjugal  madrigals — "  One  Word  More  :  " 

"  I  shall  never  in  the  years  remaining 

Paint  your  pictures,  no,  nor  carve  your  statues, 

Make  you  music  that  should  all  express  me. 

So,  it  seems,  I  stand  in  my  attainment. 

This  of  verse  alone  our  life  allows  me  ; 

Verse  and  nothing  else  have  I  to  give  thee. 

Other  heights  in  other  lives,  God  vv'illing  ; 

All  the  gifts  from  all  the  heights,  your  own,  love." 

Finally,  in  the  Last  Look  at  England,"  his  grief  and 
hope  found  a  touching  but  veiled  embodiment : 

But  the  moans  of  the  sea  swallow  up  all  gayer  fancies,  and  the 
too  familiar  lines  roll  and  dash  upon  the  inner  and  unseen  shores  of 
the  soul : 

'•  Break,  break,  break, 

On  thy  cold,  gray  rocks,  O  sea ! 
But  the  tender  grace  of  a  day  that  is  dead 

Will  never  come  back  to  me." 

The  day  will  come  back  to  all  who  sorrow  not  without  hope,  more 
tender,  more  lovely,  without  night  and  without  end.  "  Break  from 
thy  throne,  illustrious  morn  !  " 

How  sublimely  the  faith  of  the  Gospel  exalts  itself  above  these 
moaning,  beating  waves  of  sorrow  and  time.  They  may  howl  with 
anguish  ;  they  may  leap  upon  its  base,  and  throw  their  cold  spray 
far  up  its  lofty  sides  ;  but  they  neither  shake  its  foundations  nor  be- 
dew its  summits. 

But  while  he  shunned  all  human  conversation  about 
and  direct  references  to  his  lost  companion,  he  cherished 
her  memory  with  marvelous  intensity.  Most  of  his 
near  friends  knew  that  he  had  lost  his  wife  during  the 
first  week  in  April,  and  that  the  shadow  of  that  dread 


Mary  in  Heaven.  199 

eclipse  would  annually  becloud  his  path.  As  the  ses- 
sions of  the  New  England  Conference  then  fell  that 
week,  he  was  apt  to  pass  that  solemn  period  in  the  com- 
pany of  many  of  his  clerical  brethren.  The  writer  sat 
beside  him  on  one  anniversary  of  his  bereavement,  the 
third  of  April,  1865  ;  we  were  both  eagerly  listening  to 
a  very  eloquent  speech  before  the  assembly  by  George 
Thompson,  the  English  Abolitionist,  on  the  occasion  of 
the  fall  of  Richmond.  As  will  be  seen  hereafter,  he  was 
living  over  in  memory  the  scenes  of  the  hour  of  parting 
with  his  wife  ;  yet  he  seemed  wholly  absorbed  in  that 
wonderful  address,  unless  a  somewhat  unusual  restless- 
ness betrayed  the  intense  emotion  which  was  flaming  so 
hotly  within.  Here  and  there  a  friend  whom  a  like  sor- 
row had  made  keener-sighted  than  the  rest  might  discern 
what  was  going  on  ;  the  rest  would  not.  One  of  these, 
Bishop  Henry  W.  Warren,  tells  us  how  he  had  pene- 
trated his  secret. 

I  have  found  him,  in  subsequent  years,  in  a  kind  of  exalted,  holy 
hush,  on  the  third  day  of  April,  and  he  would  say,  "  This  is  the  me- 
morial day,"  and  I  knew  only  too  well  what  he  meant,  and  one  day 
said  to  him  : 

"  Sustain  that  exaltation, 

Expand  that  tender  light, 
And  hold  with  lover  passion 

Thy  blessed  in  thy  sight." 

He  answered,  "That  is  just  what  I  constantly  do." 

Gradually  he  came  to  treat  as  memorial  days  of  his 
Mary  in  heaven  their  wedding  day  and  parting  day,  his 
own  birthday  and  hers,  and  sometimes  the  birthday  of 


200 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


one  of  the  children.  These  were  not  generally  known 
outside  the  home  circle,  so  that  an  intimate  friend  might 
unwittingly  intrude  upon  some  such  sacred  vigil.  This 
the  writer  did  once.  He  was  so  restless  and  disturbed 
that  we  could  not  refrain  from  trying  to  get  away.  He 
would  not  consent,  or  tell  his  sad  secret.  He  was  rest- 
less, excited,  talkative,  and  absent-minded  by  turns.  Yet 
the  talk  was  bright  and  charming. 

On  such  occasions  he  was  wont  to  enter  some  memo- 
rial words  in  the  Journal.  No  literary  intention  presided 
over  these  entries,  since  they  are  usually  set  in  a  frame- 
work of  the  most  ordinary  materials.  Gradually  there 
came  out  in  this  way  accounts  of  the  death  and  burial  of 
Mary  Haven,  which  are  valuable  now,  and  such  an  ex- 
pression of  his  sorrow  as  is  without  parallel  almost  in  the 
records  of  human  woe.  It  is  the  more  important  to  de- 
velop this  part  of  his  history,  because  he  kept  it  so  jeal- 
ously hidden,  and  led  such  an  openly  jovial  existence, 
that  he  was  constantly  misunderstood. 

It  is  the  inmost  soul  of  Gilbert  Haven  which  comes 
out  in  these  memorabilia  of  the  heart.  The  dates  to  be 
borne  in  mind  are,  his  birthday,  September  19;  Mary's, 
October  2  ;  Willie's,  January  30 ;  Mamie's,  May  7  ;  Ber- 
tie's, March  29  ;  their  w^edding  day,  September  17;  and 
his  wife's  death,  April  3  ;  and  Gilbert  Haven's  victory 
over  death,  Januaiy  3,  1880,  a  little  more  than  three 
months  later  than  the  final  entry  now  to  be  read : 

April  5,  1864.  What  a  great  gap  betwixt  that  last  writing  and 
this.  How  hilarious  then  !  How  sad,  how  gloomy  now  !  How  little 
did  I  think  that  in  such  prosperity  the  destroyer  would  come;  and 


Mary  in  Heaven. 


201 


come  so  suddenly,  so  completely,  so  awfully.  Four  years  ago  to- 
night I  carried  my  darling  to  the  graveyard,  and  left  her  beside  an 
open  grave.  O  God  !  how  dreadful  that  hour  and  every  hour  since. 
They  laid  her  in  a  tomb,  because  Bertie,  our  boy,  was  dying  ;  and 
on  the  morrow  we  placed  him  in  her  arms  and  carried  her  to  her 
home.  "  How  died  the  happy  hours  before  my  death  !  "  They  have 
died  ever  since.  To-night  I  have  buried  myself  in  the  withered  grass 
that  covers  her  sweet,  sweet  face,  and  now,  more  crazy  than  any 
thing  else,  I  sit  here  alone.  God  is  my  helper.  His  love  alone  sup- 
ports my  soul.  I  sink  in  deep  waters,  but  he  goes  with  me,  blessed 
be  his  name  forever  ! 

How  could  Dr.  Beecher  call  his  wife,  my  dear  friend,  and  she  him  ? 
But  I  must  not  open  these  flood-gates.    How  the  deep,  dark,  dread- 
ful waters  roll  and  moan  and  dash.    The  deep  waters  have  gone  v 
over  my  soul ;  yes,  how  high  over  my  soul !    And  yet,  "  How  do  thy 
mercies  close  me  round." 

September  17,  1864.  The  dreadful  day  has  come,  and  is  almost 
gone.  A  beautiful  day,  very  like  "  the  maddest,  merriest  day,  the 
highest,  happiest  day,"  of  my  little  life.  What  a  blessed  day  that ! 
How  miserable  my  life!  God  forgive  me;  God  sustain  me!  It 
seems  as  if  I  must  break  in  pieces,  so  fiercely  dash  the  waves  and 
tides  upon  my  poor,  stranded,  wrecked  hull.  Thirteen  years  since 
that  happy  ride  to  Poughkeepsie.  How  blissful !  It  seemed  then 
as  if  it  would  last  forever.  Will  it  ?  God  knows.  Four  of  these 
dreadful  anniversaries  have  covered  this  happiest  of  birthdays 
— the  birthday  of  our  souls  and  bodies — with  their  heavy  palls. 
When  will  they  be  lifted  ?  Death,  how  welcome  !  O,  that  thou 
wouldst  hide  me  in  the  grave  !  O  that  mortality  were  swallowed 
up  of  life  ! 

Septej7tber  18,  1864.  I  have  been  reading  past  memorials  here.  It 
seems  as  though  somebody  else  wrote  them.  I  could  not  have 
been  that  hilarious,  brain-crazed  dashaway  who  blazes  his  way 
through  a  wilderness  of  verbiage.  Yet  so  it  was  ;  certain  passages 
prove  it  was  myself.  So  dreary  is  this  present.  I  sit  at  this  table 
and  muse  and  mourn  and  yearn  for  my  darling  who  will  never  re- 


202 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


turn.  Is  it  right?  I  cannot  answer;  I  cannot  rise  above  it.  Lively 
and  ciiatty  I  am  still  called,  but  it  is  the  life  of  the  Spartan  boy  : 

"  Who  smiles  and  smiles, 

Though  secret  wounds  do  bleed  beneath  the  cloak." 

I  have  thought  to-day  that  I  ought  to  lay  off  this  state  of  soul,  rise 
out  of  it,  and  move  calmly  on  as  though  I  had  never  lived  and  loved 
before.  How  preposterous  !  As  well  live  without  identity.  The 
Burden-bearer,  who  found  a  friend  to  lift  his  cross  from  his  crushed 
shoulders,  will  help  me  carry  mine.    Blessed  Christ ! 

October  2,  1864.  A  very  stormy  day;  few  at  church.  I  preached 
in  the  morning  on,  "  We  count  them  happy  which  endure."  Wrote 
it  yesterday  in  memory  of  Mary's  birthday.  What  a  happy  day  once  ; 
how  unhappy  now. 

Christmas,  1864.  I  have  been  spending  a  little  time  reading  some 
of  the  dear,  dear  letters  of  my  darling.  How  sweet,  how  simple. 
"  How  my  soul  grows  weary,  weary.  O  God,  that  I  were  dead  !  "  I 
get  so  dreary  I  care  not  much  at  times  what  happens.  Yet  they  call 
me  most  jolly : 

"And  when  they  win  a  smile  from  me, 
They  think  that  I  forget." 

O  my  Saviour,  stand  by  me.  Uphold  me  in  the  dreadful  race. 
Thou  didst  suffer  infinitely  more  than  I,  and  that  unjustly. 

March  26,  1865.  The  dreadful  week  draws  near.  I  have  thought 
of  but  little  else  to-day,  and  have  been  almost  distraught  to-night ;  a 
lake  of  tire  within,  but  Christ  enabling  me  to  endure.  How  long,  O 
Lord,  how  long  !  Yet  I  fear  to  die.  I  fear  sometimes  that  I  am  in 
the  wrong  thus  to  grieve.  I  ask  sometimes,  ought  I  thus  to  cherish 
a  feeling  which  God  has  interrupted  }  O  my  God,  hast  thou  inter- 
rupted it  ? 

April  3,  1865.  The  day  of  dread  is  come  again.  How  different 
from  that  delightful  one  I  used  to  look  forward  to,  the  17th  of  Sep- 
tember. I  was  in  Conference  at  twelve  o'clock,  listening  to  George 
Thompson's  eloquence,  and  thinking  only  of  my  sorrow.    I  lay  on 


Mary  in  Heaven. 


203 


the  grave  at  sundown,  and  was  somewhat  comforted,  though  horror 
at  death  troubled  me.  "  Is  there  no  balm  in  Gilead  ?  "  God  strength- 
en my  poor  soul. 

May  y,  iS6s.  Sad,  sad,  sad,  this  night  how  dreadful !  I  think  of  the 
hour  seven  years  ago,when  dear  Mary  was  born.  What  anxiety,  yet 
blessedness  then  !  what  lack  of  both  now  !  It  cannot  be,  it  must 
not  be,  I  am  often  tempted  to  say  ;  but  God  helps  me  to  grasp  what 
I  was  enabled  to  at  first — "  Thy  will  be  done."  O  how  dark,  and 
yet  how  light !  Blessed  be  his  name  forever  for  the  light  which 
shines  upon  the  grave  ! 

September  18,  1865.  The  clock  has  just  struck  eleven  ;  early  for 
me.  I  wished  to  write  here  last  night,  but  Brother  Prentice  stopped 
with  me,  and  we  talked  till  three  o'clock  in  the  morning  on  many 
and  interesting  themes.  Yet  my  heart  dwelt  only  on  one  theme,  that 
day.  Yesterday  was  precisely  like  the  blessed  original — calm,  warm, 
sunny.  O  how  sweet  was  that !  I  have  mourned  through  another 
year  with  much  sin  and  sorrow,  with  some  pardon  and  peace.  .  . 
May  the  Lord  help  me  to  abide  holy,  faithful,  and  pure  !  Where 
shall  I  be  at  the  next  anniversary  ?  Perhaps  this  is  my  last.  God 
preserve  me  blameless  unto  his  coming  and  kingdom.  My  yester- 
day's sermon  is  my  daily  source  of  strength,  a  sermon  first  preached 
in  Amenia  on  the  text,  "  And  when  Jesus  knew  that  the  time  had 
come  that  he  should  be  offered  up,  he  steadfastly  set  his  face  to  go  to 
Jerusalem."  Willy  and  Mamie  soothe  my  sorrow,  but  the  darkness 
never  goes. 

"  The  morning  comes  and  goes, 

And  lovely  is  the  rose  ; 

The  moon  doth  with  delight 

Look  round  her  when  the  heavens  are  bare; 

Waters  on  a  starry  night 

Are  beautiful  and  fair  ; 

The  sunshine  is  a  glorious  birth, 

But  yet  I  know 

Where'er  I  go 

That  there  hath  passed  away  a  glory  from  this  earth." 


204 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Friday,  March  29,  1866,  10  P.  M.  An  eclipse  is  just  beginning  on 
the  lower  edge  of  a  full  moon,  sailing  in  very  clear  heavens.  It  will 
be  total.  An  eclipse  began  on  my  soul  at  almost  this  hour  six  years 
ago,  which  has  been  total  how  long  !  Yet  a  rim  of  heavenly  glor}' 
shines  behind  it,  if  not  around.  I  would  dwell  in  that  light  rather 
than  in  its  gloom.  ...  My  head  is  clogged  and  cloudy,  and  body 
feeble.  What  will  be  the  end  of  the  long  weakness  God  only  knows. 
I  would  be  submissive  to  his  will  as  my  soul's  soul  was  when  that 
shock  struck  her  at  nine  o'clock  that  night.  I  sat  writing  in  my 
study  when  the  nurse  called  me.  I  found  Mary  in  a  chill,  flew  for 
the  doctor,  and  all  that  night  we  strove  to  stay  the  inevitable.  O  the 
horror,  the  sorrow  of  sorrows  ! 

"  How  bright  the  unchanging  morn  appears." 

I  have  lived  much  since  then,  acquired  more  influence  and  repute, 
been  flattered  and  praised,  but  her  face  cannot  smile  responsive. 
My  jourr;eys,  writings,  the  demands  for  my  pen,  books,  and  all  are 
poorest,  paltriest  substitutes  for  her  voice  and  presence.  God  keep 
me  patient,  and  make  me  more  and  more  humble  and  loving,  like 
her  on  earth  and  in  the  heavens. 

October  2,  1865.  I  have  been  thinking  all  to-day  that  it  is  my 
dear  Mary's  birthday.  Thirty-four  years  old  would  she  have  been 
had  she  stayed  with  me.  I  cannot  think  her  of  so  great  age— so 
youthful,  so  girlish  almost,  she  seems  to  me.  I  remember  I  saw  her 
on  that  first  night  after  my  arrival  in  Amenia,  that  beautiful  summer 
night,  and  her  sweet,  girlish  face  ;  and  those  later  revelations  of  her 
loveliness,  when  the  eyes  glowed  with  undying  love,  and  in  her  early 
married  days,  so  pleasant,  so  lovely  ;  and  even  in  the  last  hours,  when 
her  face  looked  rosier  and  lovelier  than  ever ;  nay,  even  in  the  tomb  the 
flush  and  the  girlishness  were  there.  How  surely  are  they  in  heaven. 
Jesus  comes.  "  I  will  not  leave  you  comfortless,  I  will  come  unto 
you."  Happy  day  this  was  ;  will  it  ever  be  again  ?  A  beautiful  day 
this,  perfect  in  its  autumn  loveliness. 

August  2,  1866.  Sat  in  Sarah's  doorway  and  looked  at  the  stars 
rimmed  with  elm  boughs  as  if  wreathed  in  foliage.    Talked  on  court- 


Mary  in  Heaven. 


205 


ship,  and  so  my  soul  flew  back  to  the  glorious  Valley  and  its  visions 
of  delight,  and  forward  to  when  and  where  ?  But  the  past  lives  forever. 
I  never  talk  of  it  to  any  one.  Many  have  blamed  me  for  not  talking 
of  it.  But  its  bliss,  how  eternal !  If  I  never  see  her  in  the  eternities 
to  come,  those  blessed  moonlights  shall  never  be  forgotten,  nor  the 
sweeter  ones  which  followed  them  from  Northampton  to  Cambridge. 

"  Dear  as  remembered  kisses  after  death, 
Deep  as  love, 
Deep  as  first  love  and  wild  with  all  regret, 
O  death  in  life,  the  days  that  are  no  more." 

March  24,  1867.  It  is  nearly  twenty  years  since  this  book  was 
opened.  I  little  thought  then  twenty  years  would  not  fill  it.  Still 
less  did  I  think  of  the  life  I  should  pass  through — the  love,  joy,  and 
sorrow — all  infinitely  beyond  expression.  To-night  I  sit  here  sick 
and  sad.  The  burden  of  life  grows  heav}-.  The  hour  when  it  shall 
be  laid  down  appears  pleasantly  in  the  not  far  off  future. 

March  29,  1867.  This  day  seven  years  ago  my  Bertie  was  born. 
How  happy,  how  relieved  we  were.  How  near  also  to  the  thick 
darkness,  darkness  thicker  and  thicker,  till  that  perfect  day,  when  it 
shall  become  perfect  light. 

April  3,  1867.  The  dreadful  day  has  surely  come.  A  beautiful 
day  as  was  that — calm,  sunny,  sweet.  I  sat  in  the  State  House 
hearing  Governor  Andrew  denounce  prohibition,  and  saw  the  clock 
climb  steadily  round  to  twelve.  Fales  was  at  my  side  now  as  then. 
How  little  he  thought  what  I  was  thinking  about.  I  came  home, 
played  with  the  children,  and,  after  tea  and  dark,  went  and  laid  my 
weary  head  on  the  bed  where  she  had  slept  so  long.  I  stroked  the 
long,  dry  grass,  which  seemed  soft  and  like  her  hair.  I  kissed  the  head, 
and  thought  of  the  seven  long  years.  I  did  not  think  when  she  went 
I  could  have  stayed  so  long  behind,  but  I  have,  and  yet  not,  for  my 
strong  body  has  given  way.  I  am  weak  and  wear}',  head  in  confu- 
sion and  peril.  Is  not  all  this  wrong?  God  forgive  me  if  it  is,  and 
help  me  to  sink  into  him.  How  much  I  think  of  her,  and  how  I  long 
and  long  and  long  to  see  her! 


206 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


"  Day  after  day  I  think  what  she  is  doing 

In  those  bright  realms  of  air  ; 
Year  after  year  her  holy  steps  pursuing, 

Behold  her  grown  more  fair." 

September  17,  1867.  Another  of  the  saddest,  sweetest  days.  How 
sad,  how  sweet.  Beautiful  as  that  day  was  fifteen  years  ago — soft, 
warm,  sunny,  calm.  How  dreadful,  how  delightful.  Where  is  she 
now,  so  loved,  so  lovely  }  I  see  her  blessed  eyes  as  they  beamed  full 
of  love.  Ah  me !  I  thought  of  those  deep  lines  of  "  The  Earth 
Song:" 

"  The  old  stars 

Look  down  into  the  old  seas  ; 

Old  are  the  shores, 

But  where  are  the  old  men  ? 

I  that  have  seen  much, 

Such  have  I  never  seen." 

April  5.  1868.  Next  to  the  third,  my  day  of  darkness  is  this.  My 
week  of  sorrow  covers  these  dreadful  days.  I  went  to  the  grave  at 
dark  to-night.  Snow  fell  to- day,  and  a  cold  winter  wind  blew,  and 
darkness,  snow,  and  winter  lay  on  my  heart.  Eight  years  have  gone 
since  that  afternoon  I  followed  my  darling,  never  before  forbidden 
to  ride  with  her,  on  that  awful  ride  from  Cambridge  to  Maiden.  A 
few  weeks  before,  the  first  of  January,  I  had  come  over  the  same 
road  with  her  in  a  sleigh.  Now  she  led,  and  I,  alas  !  was  compelled 
to  follow. 

September  17,  1868.  Seventeen  years  —  the  seventeen  days  are 
matched  in  years.  It  is  midnight.  I  shrink  from  this  page.  I 
write  with  glasses  on  my  eyes.  1  am  getting  ripe.  Is  it  for  glory  ? 
Alas,  is  it  }    My  soul  reels  and  staggers  as  of  yore. 

"  O  for  the  touch  of  a  vanished  hand. 
And  the  sound  of  a  voice  that  is  still ! " 

I  think  of  that  day.  I  believe  every  17th  of  September  has  been 
outwardly  beautiful  since  that  most  beautiful  one.  .  .  .  How  dread- 
ful the  feelings  that  yet  rise  and  roll.    But  I  near  the  goal.  Forty- 


Mary  in  Heaven. 


207 


seven  years  old  next  Saturday — no  longer  a  young  man.  Yet  I  feel 
very  young  at  times,  and  rejoice  in  these  signs  of  immortal  youth  of 
soul  in  God  the  Saviour.  Sometimes  floods  of  doubt  arise ;  but  I 
have  most  of  the  time  a  calm  assurance  of  heaven. 

April  4,  1869.  The  three  days'  eclipse  is  again  upon  me;  this  is 
the  central  day.  Though  busy  all  the  forenoon  my  feelings  were  yet 
busier.  In  the  afternoon  I  was  full  of  sorrow  and  pining,  and  in  the 
evening  went  with  Willy  to  Mary's  grave.  We  knelt,  and  I  prayed  for 
him,  and  Mamie,  and  us  all,  that  the  family  might  be  united.  I  have 
many  hours  when  the  sense  of  loss  seems  insupportable ;  yet  God 
sustains  me.  I  see  the  end  coming.  Nine  years  ago  she  lay  dead  in 
the  house  she  had  ruled  nine  years.  More  than  half  the  time  that 
we  have  been  married  has  she  been  in  Paradise ! 

"  The  days  drag  on,  though  clouds  keep  out  the  sun, 
And  thus  the  heart  will  break,  and  brokenly  live  on." 

God  bless  my  dears  on  earth  and  in  heaven ! 

September  19,  1869.  I  am  getting  so  that  I  dare  not  write  in  the 
Journal.  It  is  a  sad  book.  Mother  says  I  shall  be  as  gloomy  as  she 
if  I  get  as  old.  I  fear  it ;  for  I  am  often  sad,  though  merry  to  out- 
siders.   Friday,  my  wedding  anniversary,  was  a  beautiful,  soft  day. 

April -^y,  1870.  Ten  years  ago  this  noon  my  dearest  entered  that 
grand  country,  as  she  herself  called  it.  That  was  a  sweet,  sunny 
day  ;  this  is  cold  and  stormy,  full  of  driving  snow.  1  was  so  tired 
that  I  lay  abed  till  after  eleven.  My  feelings  helped  my  weariness. 
My  heart  is  exceeding  sorrowful,  yet  I  can  often  add,  "  always  re- 
joicing." I  try  to  keep  cheerful.  But  there's  an  aching  void  ;  how 
empty  and  aching ! 

April  5,  1870.  To-night  at  dark,  in  a  rain,  I  laid  my  hand,  my 
head,  my  lips,  on  the  soft,  gray,  moist  grass  at  her  head.  I  did  not 
feel  strong  enough  to  go  there.    Ten  years  ;  O,  my  God  ! 

September  17,  1871.  I  seldom  enter  these  pages  now  ;  but  this  twen- 
tieth anniversary  of  that  wedding  day  draws  me  to  them.  I  find  my  last 
entry  a  year  and  a  half  ago,  on  that  more  dreadful  anniversary,  when 
death  parted  us.    It  has  been  a  warm,  sunny,  and  cloudy  day,  of  a 


2o8  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


dog-day  type ;  though  not  as  hot  and  smiling  as  that  Wednesday 
twenty  years  ago,  when  two,  long  one  in  heart,  were  made  one  in 
name,  flesh,  and  spirit.  The  larger  part  of  these  bridal  days  have 
been  burial  days.  The  years  in  which  I  have  not  seen  her  are  more 
than  those  I  spent  with  her.  I  talk  but  little  about  it,  and  few  know 
the  hidden  loneliness  and  longing. 

September  17,  1872.  This  day  my  heart  and  mind  have  been  on 
one  theme.  The  seventeenth.  O,  happy  day,  happy  day  !  Twenty- 
one  years  ago  how  happy.  Will  it  ever  be  again  }  God  help  me  and 
keep  me.    It  is  nearly  midnight.    Jesus  guide  me,  weary  and  sad. 

India7iola,  Texas,  April  6,  1873.  This  day  is  the  thirteenth  anni- 
versary of  my  last  look  at  my  dear  Mary,  as  she  lay  in  her  grave, 
with  the  baby  in  her  arms  ;  her  face  was  as  ruddy  as  if  asleep  and 
well.  And  was  she  not  ?  It  is  we  who  are  sick  and  dead,  not  the 
departed.    How  desolate  the  sea  [he  was  beside  it]  looks,  and  life. 

September  17,  1873.  It  is  one  o'clock.  This  night  of  nights — the 
same  night,  Wednesday,  that  then  was.  I  came  from  Saratoga  to 
Poughkeepsie,  the  reverse  of  my  wedding  trip,  last  Friday.  Have  a 
beautiful  place  here,  and  every  thing  lovely.  But  how  lonely.  My 
soul  bleeds  awfully. 

April  5,  1874.  The  dreadful  days  have  come,  and  three  have  gone. 
How  perpetually  does  my  soul  enter  its  eclipse  at  this  time  of  the 
year.  I  preached,  and  had  many  compliments.  I  was  thinking  of 
the  dreadful  day.  Fourteen  years.  How  slow  they  roll  ;  how  fast, 
too.  I  seem  to  suffer  more  than  ever.  This  everlasting  wandering 
makes  me  more  lonesome  and  homesick. 

September  17,  1874.  I  should  not  write  to-night,  but  I  cannot  help 
it.  All  this  soft  fall  day  that  day  has  been  before  me,  as  soft  and 
balmy  as  this.  Fifteen  years  to-day  was  the  last  time  I  celebrated 
it.  When  shall  I  celebrate  it  again  1  It  may  be  soon.  I  have  writ- 
ten a  long  letter  to  Mamie,  and  filled  it  with  talk  of  that  day. 

September  19,  1875.  Fifty-four  years  ago  to-night  I  began  to  be 
on  this  earth.  A  long  life  ;  a  mixed  one,  happy  and  unhappy.  How 
happy  and  how  unhappy  it  is  not  possible  to  tell.  The  bliss  and  the 
woe  center  in  my  married  life.    Only  eight  and  a  half  years  out  of 


Mary  in  Heaven.  209 

fifty-four,  and  yet  outweighing  the  rest  infinitely  to  me.  Friday  was 
the  wedding  day. 

May  7,  1876.  I  omitted  this  year  to  write  here  at  or  near  the 
3d  of  April.  Not  that  I  forgot  it.  I  was  holding  Conference  at 
Philadelphia.  The  day  was  busy  and  exciting,  but  I  did  not  once 
forget  the  mid-noon  hour.  It  was  a  dreadful  period.  Is  it  right  } 
God  forgive  me,  if  it  is  not ! 

April  13,  1879.  Spent  Monday  night  with  my  classmate,  S.  F. 
Beach,  Esq.,  at  Alexandria,  Va.  His  wife  died  last  winter.  For  the 
first  time  in  my  life,  almost,  I  saw  tears  in  his  eyes.  My  conversa- 
tion was  about  "Warrington,"  Mar}%  and  my  own  conversion.  May 
the  Holy  Spirit  bless  it  to  him ! 

October  12,  1879.  Will,  Mary,  and  I  celebrated  the  wedding  day 
with  a  ride  on  the  Alameda,  of  San  Jose,  Cal.,  we  three  alone.  We 
have  not  been  together  on  that  day  before  for  years.  Where  and 
how  did  the  other  three  spend  it  }  When  shall  we  all  six  spend  it 
together  }    Where  ?    And  how  } 

This  record  tells  its  own  pathetic  story  to  the  heart  and 
the  imagination  of  every  reader.  We  know  nothing  so 
moving  in  all  the  range  of  literature.  It  is  only  necessary 
to  compare  this  natural  account  of  the  death  of  Mary  Ha- 
ven and  the  perpetual  sorrow  of  her  husband  with  famous 
stories  of  similar  events  to  grasp  its  marv^elous  superior- 
ity. There  is  a  wonderful  burial  scene  in  Chateaubri- 
and's '^Atala."  But  impressive  as  it  is,  and  much  as  it 
deserves  to  be  studied  for  its  art,  it  is  open  to  some  tell- 
ing criticism.  On  reading  it  again  the  other  day,  a  ref- 
erence in  our  copy  pointed  to  a  chapter  in  Sainte  Beuve  s 
work  on  ''Chateaubriand  et  son  Groiipe  Litteraire^'  where 
this  scene  is  discussed  in  detail,  and  contrasted  with  an- 
other which  deserves  to  become  better  known.  These 
stories  differ  from  the  one  just  read  in  the  particular  that 


210 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


the  lover  in  each  case  is  obliged  to  pause  in  the  wilder- 
ness and  bury  his  beloved  with  his  own  hands.  This 
gives  occasion  for  some  beautiful  impulses  and  move- 
ments in  the  narratives  which  are  not  found  in  Gilbert 
Haven's  fragmentary  recital  ;  but  it  will  be  seen  whether 
the  latter  really  suffers  on  that  account.  We  shall  let 
Sainte  Beuve  cite  and  comment  upon  and  develop  the 
contrasts  of  the  two  French  burial  stories  :  that  of  Atala 
by  her  lover  Chactas  and  the  hermit  priest  Father  Au- 
brey, and  that  of  Manon  Lescaut  by  the  Chevalier  des 
Grieux : 

•*  Toward  evening  we  transported  her  precious  remains  to  an  open- 
ing of  the  grotto,  which  looked  towards  the  north.  The  hermit 
had  wrapped  them  in  a  piece  of  European  linen,  spun  by  his  moth- 
er ;  it  was  the  only  property  remaining  to  him  from  his  native 
country,  and  he  had  .  long  intended  it  for  his  own  tomb.  Atala 
was  laid  upon  a  turf  of  mountain  sensitive  plants  ;  her  feet,  her  head, 
and  a  part  of  her  breast  were  exposed.  In  her  locks  was  seen  a 
withered  magnolia  flower,  one  which  I  had  deposited  on  the  virginal 
bed  in  order  to  render  it  fruitful.  Her  lips,  like  a  rosebud  gathered 
a  few  hours  ago,  seemed  to  languish  and  smile.  Blue  veins  showed 
themselves  in  her  brilliantly  white  cheeks.  Her  fine  eyes  were  closed, 
her  modest  feet  were  brought  together,  and  her  alabaster  hands 
pressed  an  ebony  cross  upon  her  heart ;  the  scapulary  of  her  vows 
was  passed  around  her  neck.  She  seemed  laid  under  a  spell  by  the 
angel  of  melancholy,  and  by  the  double  slumber  of  innocence  and  the 
tomb.  I  have  seen  nothing  more  celestial.  Anybody,  ignorant  that 
this  young  maiden  had  enjoyed  the  light  of  day,  might  have  taken 
her  for  a  statue  of  slumbering  virginity." 

This  Chactas  was  certainly  a  painter  and  sculptor  before  being  a 
lover  ;  one  might  believe  that  on  his  passage  through  France  he  had 
studied  at  the  Primatice.  He  remembers  the  sacred  death  of  Polyx- 
ena.    Girodet,  in  his  well-known  picture,  has  only  copied  and  trans- 


Mary  in  Heaven. 


211 


lated  the  poet.  This  group  of  Chateaubriand's  is  a  Carrara  marble  ; 
a  divine  inorbidezza  breathes  over  it. 

"  The  moon  lent  her  pale  torch  to  this  funereal  watch.  She  rose  at 
the  noon  of  night,  like  a  white  vestal  coming  to  weep  over  the  coffin 
of  a  companion.  Presently  she  spread  abroad  in  the  woods  that 
melancholic  mystery  which  she  loves  to  whisper  to  the  ancient  oaks 
and  to  the  antique  shores  of  the  seas." 

Let  us  admire  here  the  genius  of  Chateaubriand  in  all  its  original- 
ity and  beauty.  He  devises  means  to  add  somewhat  to  those  elysian 
and  delicious  moonlights  of  Bernadin  de  Saint  Pierre.  His  own 
have  a  touch  of  higher  melancholy  and  dolefulness. 

And  further  on,  after  that  night  of  poetry  and  of  prayer,  even  more 
enchanting  than  blest : 

"  However,  a  bar  of  gold  was  forming  in  the  east.  The  sparrow- 
hawks  were  crying  out  above  the  cliffs,  the  martins  were  returning  to 
the  hollow  of  the  ash-trees  :  this  was  the  signal  for  Atala's  funeral 
train  to  start.  I  took  the  body  upon  my  shoulders ;  the  hermit 
marched  before  me,  a  spade  in  his  hand.  We  began  to  descend 
from  rock  to  rock  ;  old  age  and  death  slackened  our  pace  equally." 

This  bar  of  gold,  the  sparrow-hawks  and  martins,  signalizing  the 
dawn,  are  features  which  are  not  ^ound  unless  they  have  been  ob- 
served. This  sets  the  seal  of  reality  on  the  ideal  itself.  We  be- 
lieve in  the  reality  of  things  which  are  attested  by  such  character- 
istic signs  stolen  from  nature.  What  a  pity  that  he  who  could  see 
them  did  not  stick  to  them,  and  keep  from  going  too  far  every  mo- 
ment ! 

"  Then,  taking  a  little  handful  of  dust,  and  observing  a  fearful 
silence,  I  for  the  last  time  fastened  my  eyes  upon  the  face  of  Atala. 
Then  I  poured  the  dust  of  slumber  over  a  forehead  of  eighteen 
summers." 

Chactas,  in  this  beautiful  description,  (too  beautiful  to  be  alto- 
gether touching,)  shows  no  defect  except  that  of  giving  too  much 
attention  to  the  effects  which  he  experiences,  and  of  observing  too 
closely  every  thing,  and  even  himself. 

In  the  funeral  rites  of  Manon  Lescaut,  as  in  those  of  Atala,  it  is 


212 


Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 


the  lover,  the  passionate  and  afflicted  friend,  who  is  himself  obliged 
to  bur>-  his  dearest  treasure.  In  that  incomparable  and  strictly  nat- 
ural stor}^  of  Chevalier  Des  Grieux  and  Manon  Lescaut,  what  fails, 
or,  rather,  what  is  absent  from  one  end  to  the  other,  and  what  no- 
body (reader  or  author;  thinks  about,  is  poetry  and  art ;  what  regu- 
lates and  animates  every  thing  is  passion,  passion  in  its  most  aban- 
doned and  most  natural  course,  in  its  most  ingenuous  and  expressive 
physiognomy.  When  perchance  it  happens  that  the  author,  the 
narrator,  would  find  an  image,  a  comparison,  he  is  weak,  vague,  and 
commonplace  ;  but  every  thing  which  proceeds  from  the  heart  of  the 
personage  is  direct,  natural,  alive,  brief,  and  burning.  Every  thing 
is  in  action.  Thus,  in  the  funeral  rites  of  Manon  Lescaut,  the  un- 
happy Chevalier  narrates  how  in  America,  after  a  duel  with  the 
nephew  of  the  governor  of  New  Orleans,  wounded  himself,  he  takes 
to  flight  with  Manon ;  and  there,  in  the  wilderness,  she  expires  in 
his  arms  from  lassitude  and  exhaustion  ;  he  does  not  take  that  mo- 
ment to  lavish  his  colors. 

"  Forgive  me  if  I  complete  in  few  words  a  narrative  which  is  killing 
me.  I  am  describing  to  you  an  unexampled  misfortune  ;  my  entire 
existence  is  given  up  to  bewailing  it.  But  though  I  bear  it  inces- 
santly in  my  memory,  my  soul  seems  to  recoil  with  horror  whenever 
I  attempt  to  express  it. 

"  We  had  spent  a  part  of  the  night  in  tranquillity.  I  believed  my 
dear  mistress  asleep,  and  I  dared  not  breathe  the  least  breath  for  fear 
of  troubling  her  slumbers.  At  dawn  of  day  I  perceived  by  touching 
her  hands  that  they  were  cold  and  trembling;  I  brought  them  to  my 
bosom  in  order  to  warm  them  ;  she  noticed  this  movement,  and 
making  an  effort  to  grasp  my  hands,  told  me  in  a  feeble  voice  that 
she  thought  her  last  hour  had  come. 

"  At  first  I  took  this  talk  for  the  ordinary  language  of  misfortune, 
and  responded  to  it  only  by  the  tender  caresses  of  love.  But  her 
frequent  sighs,  her  silence  to  my  questions,  the  pressure  of  her  hands 
in  which  she  continued  to  hold  mine,  made  me  comprehend  that  the 
end  of  her  misfortunes  was  approaching. 

"Do  not  urge  me  to  describe  my  feelings  nor  to  report  her  last 


Mary  in  Heaven. 


213 


words.  I  lost  her ;  I  received  from  her  tokens  of  her  love  at  the 
moment  she  expired  ;  that  is  all  I  can  tell  you  of  that  fatal  and  de- 
plorable event. 

"  My  soul  did  not  follow  hers.  Doubtless  heaven  did  not  deem  me 
severely  enough  punished,  but  wished  me  to  drag  out  a  wretched 
and  languishing  life.    I  freely  renounce  knowing  a  happier  one. 

"  I  remained  more  than  twenty-four  hours  with  my  lips  fastened 
upon  the  face  and  the  hands  of  my  dear  Manon.  It  was  my  design 
to  die  there  ;  but  at  the  beginning  of  the  second  day  I  reflected  that 
her  body  would  be  exposed  after  my  death  to  become  the  food  of 
wild  beasts.  I  took  the  resolution  to  bury  her  and  await  death  over 
her  grave.  I  was  already  so  near  my  end  through  the  enfeeblement 
caused  by  fasting  and  pain,  that  I  was  obliged  to  struggle  in  order 
to  stand.  I  was  obliged  to  resort  to  the  strong  drink  I  had  brought ; 
this  rendered  me  the  strength  which  was  needed  for  the  sad  office  I 
was  about  to  execute.  It  was  not  hard  for  me  to  open  the  ground 
in  the  place  where  I  found  myself ;  it  w^as  a  field  covered  with  sand. 
I  broke  my  sword  in  order  to  make  use  of  it  in  digging ;  but  it  was 
less  serviceable  than  my  hands.  I  opened  a  broad  grave.  I  placed 
the  idol  of  my  heart  there,  after  taking  care  to  wrap  her  with  all  m.y 
clothes  to  prevent  the  sand  from  touching  her.  I  put  her  into  that 
position  only  after  having  kissed  her  a  thousand  times  with  all  the 
ardor  of  the  most  perfect  love.  I  sat  down  beside  her  ;  I  looked  at 
her  a  long  time  ;  I  could  not  resolve  to  fill  up  her  grave.  Finally, 
my  powers  beginning  to  yield  afresh,  and  foreboding  their  complete 
failure  before  the  end  of  my  enterprise,  I  buried  forever  in  the  bosom 
of  the  earth  the  most  perfect  and  amiable  being  it  had  ever  pro- 
duced. I  laid  myself  down  upon  the  grave,  my  face  turned  to  the 
sand,  and,  closing  my  eyes  with  the  design  of  never  opening  them 
again,  I  invoked  the  succor  of  Heaven,  and  awaited  death  with  im- 
patience." 

My  face  turned  to  the  sand.  .  .  .  Admirable  impulse,  but  admir- 
able as  nature  is  in  gesture,  in  action,  in  attitude,  {effiisus^  nothing 
of  art,  nothing  of  the  ancient  sculptor,  but  pure  feeling. 

"  What  will  appear  to  you  difficult  to  believe  is  that  during  the  per- 


214 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


formance  of  this  mournful  office  there  did  not  come  forth  a  sigh  from 
my  mouth  nor  a  tear  from  my  eyes.  The  profound  consternation  in 
which  I  was  and  my  deliberate  plan  of  dying  had  cut  short  all  ex- 
pressions of  despair  and  sorrow.  Nor  did  I  remain  long  in  the  post- 
ure in  which  I  was  over  the  grave  without  losing  the  little  sense  and 
feeling  which  were  left  me." 

When  we  encounter  beauty  and  truth  in  passion,  under  whatever 
form  it  may  be,  there  should  be  neither  preference  nor  choice.  We 
have  not  to  decide  between  the  two  pictures.  Let  us  merely  say 
that  true,  simple,  flowing  recitals,  cleai  as  a  fountain,  like  that  of 
Manon  Lescaut,  are  good  fortunes  which  we  do  not  encounter  twice  ; 
it  is  easier  to  diversify  beauties  of  art  than  to  begin  afresh  such  a  di- 
rect expression  of  nature. 

It  is  clear  that  the  eminent  critic  does  choose  and 
prefer  in  spite  of  the  delicacy  with  which  he  indicates 
his  opinion.  The  criticism  touches  the  vital  point  of 
the  whole  business  in  showing  by  contrast  with  self- 
conscious  grief  the  perfect  absorption  of  perfect  grief  in 
its  affliction. 

Mr.  Haven's  lines  tell  us  nothing  that  is  not  some- 
how directly  connected  with  his  precious  Mary.  Not  a 
word  is  given  to  the  friends  who  were  with  him  at  that 
trying  period.  Not  a  reference  to  any  hymn  sung, 
Scripture  read,  prayer  offered,  consolations  spoken  at 
the  funeral  ;  not  even  that  there  was  a  funeral.  We 
learn  that  Fales  H.  Newhall  was  at  his  side  then  only 
because  he  chanced  to  be  there  again  on  the  dreaded 
anniversary.  We  only  learn  that  the  day  of  burial  was 
warm  and  sunny  because  one  of  its  anniversaries  is  like 
it.  When  one  of  these  anniversaries  comes  with  snow 
in  the  air,  ice,  and  wintry  wind,  he  is  reminded  only  of 


Mary  in  Heaven.  215 

the  day  when  constant  ice,  snow,  and  winter  fell  upon 
his  heart.  A  total  eclipse  of  the  moon  on  such  a  me- 
morial night  only  brings  to  his  thoughts  the  life-long 
gloom  of  soul  which  it  so  beautifully  typifies.  The  long 
ride  from  Cambridge  to  Maiden  is  dreadful  solely  be- 
cause they  are  not  together  going  and  coming,  as  three 
months  earlier  they  were,  and  he  for  the  first  time  is 
now  forbidden  her  society.  How  her  beauty  shines 
back  upon  the  lover's  heart  through  the  slowly  creeping 
years  from  her  haunted  tomb,  and  even  seems  almost 
the  best  hope  of  the  resurrection  morn. 

Compare  this  with  the  pictures  produced  and  com- 
pared with  each  other  by  Sainte  Beuve,  and  the  broken 
narrative  of  Gilbert  Haven  will  be  found  as  free  of  all 
traces  of  self-inspection  as  Des  Grieux  is  in  telling  how 
Manon  Lescaut  died  and  was  buried.  In  naturalness 
and  abandonment  to  passion  this  tale  even  exceeds  that. 
That  a  lover,  wounded,  and  on  the  point  of  dying, 
should  resolve  in  a  kind  of  fierce  delight  to  find  death 
on  the  grave  of  the  darling  of  whom  he  has  just  been 
bereft,  is  most  natural.  And  when  he  flings  himself 
down  upon  the  mound  and  turns  his  face  to  the  sand, 
we  say,  with  Sainte  Beuve,  Admirable  impulse ! " 
When  we  find  Mr.  Haven  recording  year  after  year 
on  the  anniversary  of  his  wife's  death  or  of  their 
marriage,  "  After  dark  I  went  and  laid  my  weary  head 
on  the  bed  where  she  has  slept  so  long.  I  stroked 
the  long,  dry  grass  which  seemed  soft  and  like  her  hair. 
I  kissed  the  head,  and  thought  of  the  long  years," 
we  expect  Sainte  Beuve  to  join  us  in  saying,  Admira- 


2l6 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


ble  impulse  !  "  Surely,  if  the  spirit  of  Mary  Haven 
looked  down  upon  her  prostrate  and  tearful  lover  on 
such  nights,  she  was  prouder  in  Paradise  of  her  husband 
than  ever  she  had  been  in  the  maddest,  merriest  days  of 
courtship  and  wedded  love. 

It  would  be  missing  the  very  gem  of  this  cluster  of 
brilliants  to  see  and  appreciate  only  the  aesthetic  and 
passionate  .superiority  of  these  pages  from  the  heart  of 
Gilbert  Haven.  But  the  religious,  the  spiritual  side  of 
this  transaction,  was  the  most  important  for  him,  and  is 
the  most  profitable  for  us.  Here  is  a  man  who  goes 
near  to  distraction  over  the  dearest  bereavement  which 
could  possibly  befall  him.  He  is  so  wrought  upon  by 
his  bitter  grief  that  his  nearest  friends  sometimes  won- 
der if  he  would  get  out  of  a  bullet's  path  as  nimbly  as 
he  would  have  done  in  brighter  years.  Lowell  thinks  it 
possible  that  Lessing  had  been  seriously  thinking  of  sui- 
cide after  the  loss  of  Eva  Koenig ;  but  that  he  at  last 
somewhat  listlessly  gave  up  the  notion.  What  kept 
Gilbert  Haven  from  being  assailed  by  such  thoughts 
was  the  firmness  of  his  Christian  faith.  Blind  as  he  was 
to  the  divine  purpose  which  found  its  fulfillment  in  that 
event,  he  knew  in  the  depths  of  his  sorrow  that  this 
event  must  be  so  understood.  When  all  the  waves  and 
billows  went  over  him  in  that  tempestuous  deep  of  sor- 
row, he  was  able  to  say  from  a  broken  heart,  "  Thy  will 
be  done  !  "  There  was  the  germ  out  of  which  were  to 
come  comfort  and  strength.  It  is  needless  to  say  that 
they  did  not  come  at  once.  Fiercely  did  the  waves  of 
doubt  and  despair  gather  themselves  for  a  fresh  leap  at 


Mary  in  Heaven.  217 

his  soul  ;  and  often  it  was  all  he  could  do  to  say,  *'Thy 
will  be  done,"  and  feel  it;  and  years  go  slowly  by  before 
he  says  it  with  a  fully  consenting  heart.  He  finds  him- 
self many  times  beset  with  the  subtle  question,  whether 
he  ought  not  to  rise  above  his  trouble  and  live  as 
though  he  had  never  loved  and  lost  his  idol.  He  re- 
jects the  idea  with  the  wildest  energy,  as  if  he  dreaded 
lest  it  should  seem  his  duty  to  act  on  that  suggestion. 
And  so  the  mad  storm  of  conflicting  emotions  and 
temptations  went  on  for  weary  years.  Toward  the  close 
he  was  comforted.  He  could  not  tell  how  or  when 
the  blessed  balm  was  scattered  abroad  on  the  atmos- 
phere about  him ;  yet  he  felt  its  power  and  yielded  to 
its  benediction.  He  grew  to  talk  about  his  wife  with 
people  he  loved.  He  told  her  story  to  his  classmate, 
Beach,  in  the  hope  that  God  would  be  pleased  to  make 
it  a  solace  to  him  under  a  like  sorrow ;  and  once  he  led 
another  friend,  who  suddenly  found  his  own  sky  a  stormy 
chaos,  where, 

'*  Swift  ran  a  searching  tempest  overhead, 

And  ever  and  anon  some  bright  white  shaft 

Burnt  through  the  pine-tree  roof,  burnt  here,  burnt  there, 

As  if  God's  messenger  through  the  close  wood  screen 

Plunged  and  replunged  his  weapon  at  a  venture, 

Feeling  for  guilty  .  .  .  me," 

to  that  low  grave  whither  he  had  never  before  taken  a 
friend,  and  told  his  own  story  in  part  as  proof  that  no 
woe  is  beyond  the  divine  Physician.  For  our  part  we  can 
readily  fancy  him  in  the  dying  hour,  when  he  had  said 
the  last  good-bye  to  mother,  sister,  son,  daughter,  and 


2l8 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


kindred,  turning  his  thoughts  again  upon  his  wife  long 
enough  to  say  after  their  long  separation  : 

"  But  the  best  is  when  I  glide  from  out  them, 
Cross  a  step  or  two  of  dubious  twilight, 
Come  out  on  the  other  side,  the  novel 
Silver  lights  and  darks  undreamed  of, 
Where  I  hush  and  bless  myself  with  silence. 

"  O  their  Rafael  of  the  dear  Madonnas, 
O  their  Dante  of  the  dread  Inferno, 
Wrote  one  song — and  in  my  brain  I  sing  it, 
Drew  one  angel — borne,  see,  on  my  bosom." 


Chaplain  Haven. 


219 


CHAPTER  Xn. 


CHAPLAIN  HAVEN. 


Chaplain  of  the  Massachusetts  Eighth  Regiment— Fidelity  and  Success— War  on 
Camp  Vices— Incidents—Camp  Essex— Talk  with  Slaves— Jupiter  in  Disguise— Carroll- 
ton  Manor— Arlington— Gnats  and  Camels — Conversations  about  Slavery  with  Meth- 
odists—Camp Andrew — The  Baltimore  Preachers'  Meeting— Baltimore  and  its  Method- 
ists-Preaching—Torrey's  Prison— Haven's  Courage— His  Criticisms. 


N  the  ei£,-hteenth  of  April,  1861,  Gilbert  Haven 


^^-^  was  commissioned  chaplain  of  the  Eighth  Massa- 
chusetts Regiment  of  three  months'  volunteers,  the  first 
chaplain  commissioned  after  the  outbreak  of  the  Civil 
War.  His  own  father,  a  justice  of  the  peace,  adminis- 
tered the  oath  to  the  son.  He  went  with  the  regiment 
to  Annapolis,  Washington,  Camp  Essex,  and  Baltimore ; 
he  only  returnc^d  home  when  the  time  of  service  had 
expired.  Perhaps  Mr.  Haven  went  to  war  more  readily 
for  the  fearful  solitude  of  his  home  ;  but  he  would,  at  any 
rate,  have  been  greatly  drawn  to  a  struggle  which  smote 
upon  his  eager  ear  as  the  death-knell  of  slavery. 

Mr.  Haven  v/as  a  model  chaplain.  His  interest  in 
his  men  was  deep,  constant,  and  active.  He  preached 
to  them  on  Suadays,  and  held  religious  meetings  with 
and  for  them,  ^vhenever  he  could  collect  them  for  that 
purpose.  He  f  3und  it  easy  to  give  them  all  the  thought 
and  zeal  vvhich  were  needful  to  success.  He  held  daily 
prayers  at  first,  but  presently  found  some  of  the  men 
and  officers  reluctant  to  serve  God  with  so  much  rnore 


220 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


show  of  respect  than  they  had  done  at  home.  Hence, 
petitions  for  only  one  required  service  on  Sunday,  with 
as  many  voluntary  prayer-meetings  as  the  chaplain  could 
induce  them  to  attend.  He  believed  that  the  result 
would  be  the  failure  of  that  branch  of  the  service.  He 
did  not  see  why  a  regiment  should  be  allowed  to  shirk 
prayers  any  sooner  than  its  drill.  He  was  overruled, 
though  he  earnestly  and  with  great  courtesy  pressed  his 
views  upon  his  superiors.  With  his  accustomed  tact, 
he  used  the  opportunities  which  were  given  him  for  the 
service  of  his  men.  The  profanity  of  the  soldiers  was 
one  of  the  matters  which  both  astonished  and  grieved 
him  ;  but  he  set  his  face  as  a  flint  against  this  and  every 
vice  of  army  life  : 

Would  that  all  these  soldiers  were  lovers  of  Jesus  Christ !  Some 
are,  but  most  of  them  are  not,  but  very  worldly  and  profane.  Satur- 
day night  I  had  my  soldiers  together  for  prayers  in  the  old  Repre- 
sentatives' Hall,  and  Sunday  night  I  preached  in  the  Senate  Cham- 
ber, from  John  iii,  i6.  I  have  held  service  most  of  the  u'eek  regularly, 
though  the  New  York  Zouaves  overran  us  for  a  while.  They  went 
into  the  Senate  for  quarters  on  Saturday,  and  yesterday,  in  the  after- 
noon, I  preached  in  the  House  to  a  very  attentive  audience  on  "No 
man  that  warreth  entangleth  himself  with  the  affairs  of  this  life  ;  that 
he  may  please  him  who  hath  chosen  him  to  be  a  soldier."  2  Tim.  ii,  4. 
Had  a  pleasant  time.  In  the  evening  we  dedicated  the  Hall  with  a 
prayer-meeting,  the  first  ever  held  within  its  walls.  There  was  a 
goodly  number  in  attendance,  and  an  excellent  spirit  prevailed.  Mr. 
Johnson,  assistant  door-keeper,  was  present.  We  shall  have  many 
good  meetings  if  we  stay  here.  Brother  Usher,  paymaster  of  the 
regiment,  of  Lynn  Common  Church,  helps  me  exceedingly  in  getting 
this  part  of  the  service  into  running  order. 

In  the  afternoon  I  talked  to  the  troops  on  profanity,  from  Exodus 


Chaplain  Haven. 


221 


XX,  7  ;  a  plain,  simple  talk,  which  I  think  did  some  good.  That 
practice  has  prevailed  horribly.  I  had  no  idea  it  was  so  current  in 
the  world.  I  spoke  plainly  and  affectionately.  In  the  evening  my 
little  tent  was  full,  and  we  sang,  prayed  and  spoke,  and  had  a  melt- 
ing season  before  the  Lord.  .  .  . 

This  afternoon  Mr.  Babbage  preached  to  both  regiments  on 
"  Fight  the  good  fight  of  faith."  i  Tim.  vi,  12.  The  sight  of  so  many 
men  seated  on  the  grass  was  pleasant.  Their  attention  was  good. 
Would  that  they  were  prepared  to  meet  God.  Some  are,  blessed  be  his 
name  !  .  .  .  We  had  an  excellent  prayer-meeting  that  evening.  The 
tent  was  full ;  we  had  singing  and  speaking,  all  spiritual  and  delight- 
ful.   We  sat  and  sang  together  a  long  time  after  meeting  was  over. 

These  citations  from  Mr.  Haven's  war  Journal,  as  he 
styles  it,  may  show  the  spirit  with  which  he  did  his  work 
as  chaplain.  His  fidelity  approved  itself  so  fully  to  the 
consciences  of  the  regiment,  that  they  would  gladly  have 
retained  him  for  their  chaplain  on  re-enlisting  for  three 
years. 

This  phase  of  his  life  was  the  more  interesting  to  Mr. 
Haven  because  it  brought  him  for  the  first  time  into  di- 
rect contact  with  the  hated  system  of  slavery.  He  was 
all  eyes  and  ears  for  that ;  but  his  observations  are  too 
full  to  be  reported,  except  by  samples.  One  of  the  first 
things  which  reached  his  ears  was  a  rumor  that  General 
Butler  had  offered  his  troops  for  returning  fugitives  from 
labor,  and  putting  down  slave-risings.  The  idea  of  be- 
ing chaplain  to  a  regiment  engaged  in  such  nefarious 
business  struck  him  as  very  strange.  He  doesn't  say 
what  course  he  had  decided  upon  in  view  of  such  a  con- 
tingency ;  but  it  would  have  been  a  lively  sermon  the 
troops  would  have  listened  to  after  such  a  service.  He 


222 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


talked  freely  with  slaves,  freedmen,  slave-holders,  and 
secessionists  of  all  stripes.  We  shall  quote  some  of 
these  records  because  they  show  some  o~  the  best  traits 
of  his  nature : 

The  first  slave  I  saw,  that  I  knew  was  a  slave,  was  a  pleasant  girl 
of  twelve,  at  Professor  Smith's.  Her  name  was  Mary — strange  that 
name  should  be  thus  linked  in  my  memory  with  tliis  condition.  Yet 
I  don't  regret  it.  I  feel  that  my  darling  wife  would  rejoice  to  have 
her  dear  name  united  with  this  poor,  oppressed  people  in  my  heart. 
She  was  a  bright,  pretty  girl,  and  seemed  to  feel  her  fate.  God 
grant  her  a  speedy  release  from  it,  and  all  her  kinc  red  !  I  think  that 
this  awful  iniquity  is  near  its  end. 

Mr.  Smith,  a  clerk  in  the  Treasury  Department,  and  I  were  out  in 
the  country  spying  about,  and  we  concluded  to  get  supper  on  the 
way.  We  stopped  at  a  good-looking,  two-story  house,  painted  gray, 
on  a  hill  near  the  railroad  track.  We  came  tc  the  house  by  the 
barn  and  out-buildings,  went  round  to  the  end  door  and  found  an 
old  gentleman,  his  wife  and  daughter,  slave-holders,  by  the  name  of 
Anderson.  They  gave  us  a  good  supper  and  the  meal  tasted  de- 
liciously.  The  large  old  kitchen,  the  black  servants,  the  cool  and 
comfortable  look,  the  farm  around,  rolling  and  somewhat  woody, 
brought  back  the  dear  old  Amenia  days.  This  wa:i  my  first  sight  of  a 
plantation.  As  I  came  out  about  a  dozen  fine-looking  men  and 
women,  mostly  quite  light,  stood  near  the  barn-  yard  gate.  They 
seemed  to  understand  our  mission.  Mr.  Smith  saic  :  "  Hurrah  for  the 
Black  Republicans  !  "    They  laughed,  and  responded  quite  heartily. 

The  regiment  was  soon  removed  to  Camp  Essex,  near 
the  Relay  House.    Mr.  Haven  says  of  the  camp  : 

The  view  from  our  camp  is  charming.  At  our  feet  lies  a  narrow 
valley,  through  which  creeps  the  slumberous  Pat  ipsco,  covering  its 
face  with  willows.  Just  beneath  us  nestles  the  1  ttle  village  of  Elk 
Ridge  Landing,  once  a  port  of  entry  and  a  haven  for  ships.    But  the 


Chaplain  Havex. 


223 


washings  from  the  hills  have  choked  up  the  channel,  and  choked  off 
the  trade.  From  the  hill-top  the  village  has  a  pleasant  aspect,  with 
its  two  churches,  one  embowered  in  trees,  and  the  other  standing  in 
a  field  of  blossoming  clover,  the  white  tombstones  casting  a  moon- 
light luster  on  the  green  mounds  beneath. 

As  I  look  out  over  the  glittering  white  roofs  and  stacked  bayonets 
of  the  camp,  my  eyes  roam  over  as  delightful  a  bit  of  scenery  as  ever 
enticed  them  from  the  drudgery  of  the  pen.  A  valley  lies  beneath, 
covering  two  or  three  miles  square,  if  its  irregularity  could  be 
Quakerized  into  such  rectangular  abominations  as  a  square.  Through 
it  lazily  strolls  the  river. 

HOW  THE  SLAVES  TALK. 

I  sat  in  the  woods  reading,  when  Jupiter  came  along,  disguised  as 
a  black  man,  with  a  basket  on  his  arm  and  a  staff  in  his  hand. 
Having  been  taught  in  Grecian  mythology,  I  discovered  the  divinity 
in  spite  of  the  disguise.  I  addressed  him  respectfully.  He  was 
complacent  and  conversible.  I  asked  him  his  name.  He  had  as- 
sumed for  the  present  that  of  John  Diggs. 

"  Are  you  a  slave  ?  " 

"  No,  sir." 

"  Have  you  ever  been  ?  " 
"  Yes,  sir  ;  till  I  was  thirty  odd  years  old." 
"  How  did  you  get  your  freedom  ?  " 
"  My  mistress  gave  it  to  me  at  her  death." 
•    "  How  long  have  you  been  free  ?  " 
"  Some  fifteen  or  twenty  years." 

"  Well,  I  understand  you  free  blacks  are  not  half  so  well  off  as  the 
slaves.    That  is  true,  isn't  it  ?  " 

"  No,  sir  ;  I  live  better  than  ever  I  did  when  a  slave." 

"  But  they  say  you  wont  work — you  are  all  lazy." 

"  They  wont  give  us  a  chance,  sir.  They  don't  like  to  encour- 
age the  free  negro,  and  so  they  hire  slaves,  or  the  Irish,  and  let 
us  starve.  We  would  work  as  heartily  as  any  body  if  they  would 
hire  us." 


224 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


"  But  weren't  you  happier  when  a  slave  ?  You  had  enough  to  eat 
and  drink,  and  wherewithal  to  be  clothed." 

"  I  didn't  have  any  more  than  I  do  now  ;  and,  then,  now  when  I 
sit  dow^n  to  my  dinner  or  supper,  I  don't  have  somebody  come  blus- 
tering and  swearing  around  the  door,  swinging  his  whip  and  flogging 
me  away  to  any  kind  of  hard  work,  though  ever  so  tired.  Ah,  sir,  1 
am  a  great  deal  happier  nowadays,  eating  my  poor  supper  with  my 
wife  and  chil'n,  than  I  ever  was  when  a  slave  ?  " 

"  Have  you  any  relatives  in  slavery  ?  " 

"  All  my  brothers  and  sisters." 

"Where.?  " 

"In  Prince  George's  County,  sir." 

"  They  don't  wish  to  be  free,  do  they  ?  " 

"  Yes,  sir;  every  slave  does." 

"You  must  be  mistaken.  A  good  many  gentlemen  have  told  me 
that  they  don't  want  to  be  free." 

"  I  would  like  to  have  them  offer  the  slaves  their  liberty." 
"  But  what  makes  you  want  to  be  free  ?  " 

"  Why,  sir,  you  know,  when  a  boy's  about  thirteen  years  old  he 
feels  as  if  he'd  like  to  be  his  own  master,  and  the  feeling  don't  grow 
any  less  the  older  he  grows." 

"  Do  you  go  to  meeting  ?  " 

"  O,  yes  ;  I've  been  a  Methodist  for  over  forty  years." 

"  Why  don't  you  go  to  the  church  in  the  village  ?  " 

"O,  sir,  'pears  as  the  white  folks  don't  like  to  have  us  worship  with 
them,  so  we  have  to  have  a  house  of  our  own." 

"  Well,  religion  is  a  good  thing,  isn't  it.'*  "  V 
Sweeter  than  honey,  sweeter  than  sugar,  better  than  coffee,  sir." 

I  could  appreciate  that  climax  after  forty  days'  drinking  of  camp 
coffee.  I  was  glad  Jupiter  had  experienced  religion,  and  become  a 
humble  and  happy  Christian.  I  have  talked  with  not  a  few  blacks, 
and  find  but  one  sentiment.  An  old  man,  with  but  one  leg,  said  he 
thought  the  war  was  for  liberty. 

"  Liberty  for  whom  ?  "  I  asked. 

"  For  all  of  us,  black  and  white." 


Chaplain  Haven. 


2-5 


I  asked  him  if  he  would  fight  in  the  war. 

"  Yes,"  he  answered,  "  as  much  as  I  can  with  my  one  leg." 

At  Washington  I  asked  a  waiter  similar  questions.  He  was  free, 
had  been  born  a  slave,  bought  himself  for  six  hundred  dollars  ;  his 
wife  and  children  were  yet  slaves. 

I  asked  why  he  was  so  foolish  as  to  work  hard  and  raise  money  to 
buy  himself.  Everybody  said  the  slaves  were  better  off  than  the  free 
blacks. 

"O,  sir,"  said  he,  "I  wanted  to  lie  down  massa,  and  get  up 
massa." 

CARROLLTON  MANOR. 

The  manor-house  is  situated  near  the  turnpike.  Turn  from  the 
road,  and  go  south  through  a  pleasant,  shaded  roadway,  for  about  a 
third  of  a  mile,  and  you  come  to  the  mansion.  Near  the  road,  on  the 
right,  is  a  heap  of  slave-huts.  The  overseer's  residence,  a  good- 
sized  but  shabby-looking  brick  building,  stands  among  them.  Barns 
and  sheds  are  close  at  hand  ;  on  the  right,  through  a  long  vista  of 
trees,  an  eighth  of  a  mile  from  the  road,  stands  the  revolutionary 
house.  It  is  a  low,  spacious,  wooden,  yellow  mansion,  enlarged  evi- 
dently at  different  times,  one  of  the  later  additions  being  a  Catholic 
chapel.  ...  I  rode  a  little  way  beyond  the  house,  having  no  invita- 
tion to  stop.  Had  I  stopped,  I  should  probably  have  found  it  rather 
difficult  to  get  away,  as  the  sympathies  of  this  descendant  of  that 
patriot  are  all  with  the  secessionists. 

As  I  rode  away  I  met  a  slave  woman  dragging  herself  along  to  her 
work.  I  asked  her  how  many  colored  people  there  were  on  the  es- 
tate. She  said  there  were  better  than  a  hundred  in  these  quarters, 
and  there  were  other  quarters  above. 

"  Have  you  a  good  time  ?  " 

"  Yes,  Sundays.    We  have  to  work  hard  all  the  week,  but  we  cret 
together  Sundays,  and  enjoys  ourselves." 
"  Where  are  you  going  ?  " 

"  To  the  field,  where  the  rest  of  the  gang  is.    I  have  been  to  nurse 

my  babv." 
10* 


226 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


"  How  old  is  it  ?  " 
"  Four  months." 

The  houses  where  these  cattle  are  stabled  are  about  as  comely  and 
cleanly  as  a  pig-sty.  I  found  it  hard  to  believe  that  so  rich  and 
lordly  a  man  would  put  his  choicest  creatures  into  such  huts. 

I  drove  out  on  the  turnpike,  and  left  the  great  manor  of  Charles 
Carroll  of  Carrollton  with  profounder  detestation  than  ever  of  the 
demon  which  possessed  it,  and  which  transformed  its  servants  into 
slaves  and  its  masters  into  tyrants. 

Mr.  Haven  visited  Arlington,  the  home  of  General 
Robert  E.  Lee,  and  pushed  his  usual  inquiries  there  as 
to  the  condition  of  the  chattels  of  that  Southern  saint 
and  hero  ;  for  he  meant  to  judge  fairly. 

An  old.  gray-headed  negro,  neatly  dressed  in  a  black  suit,  sat  on 
one  of  the  door-stlls.  I  looked  in,  and  found  a  cellar  some  six  feet 
deep,  into  which  some  broken  steps  descended.  I  asked  him  if  those 
were  his  quarters.    He  replied  in  the  affirmative. 

"  Had  you  no  floor  ?  " 

"Yes,  1  had  one,  but  the  rats  troubled  me  so  I  took  it  up." 
"  How  long  have  you  lived  here  ?  " 
"  Several  years." 
"  Alone  ?  " 

"  Since  my  wife  died." 

Do  you  find  it  comfortable  down  there  ?  " 
"  O,  yes,  pretty  comfortable." 

I  looked  down.  There  was  an  excuse  for  a  bed  in  one  corner,  an 
old  broken  bit  of  a  stove,  a  little  table  with  a  dish  or  two,  with  can- 
dle ends  on  it,  a  broken  chair,  an  ax,  a  billet  or  two  of  wood,  and  the 
common  earthen  floor  of  a  cellar  ;  high  up,  out  of  reach,  was  a  dirty 
window.  Here  was  another  proof  of  the  old-fashioned  notions  that 
rule  this  region.  An  old  man  of  nearly  if  not  more  than  fourscore 
years — modest,  neat,  courteous — living  in  a  cellar  as  much  poorer 
than  any  pauper's  as  a  pauper's  is  worse  than  a  prince's  


Chaplain  Haven. 


227 


I  left  the  old  man,  so  tenderly  cared  for  by  those  he  had  served  so 
long-,  after  commending  him  to  Him  who  had  not  even  a  damp  cel- 
lar wherein  to  lay  his  head.  Crossing  to  the  opposite  buildings,  I 
saw  a  comely  quae  roon  or  octoroon  washing.  The  floor  was  still  on 
her  room,  and  half  a  dozen  lively  chattels  on  the  floor.  The  breed 
is  rather  interesting  in  its  adolescent  state.  Young  lambs,  and  pigs, 
and  dogs,  and  kittc^ns,  have  long  been  favorites  of  the  farm.  I  don't 
think  any  superior  to  the  young  of  this  species  of  property.  .  .  . 

I  asked  the  mother,  (dam,  perhaps  I  ought  to  say  ;  ma-dam,  some- 
body will  some  time  say,)  "  Whom  do  you  belong  to  ?  " 

"  Mrs.  Lee." 

"  Are  you  a  member  of  the  Church  ?  " 
"  Yes,  the  Baptist." 

"  How  many  chi  dren  have  you  ?  "  (Pardon  me  for  using  the  word 
children.  She  talked  and  acted  so  much  Hke  a  Christian  mother  that 
I  didn't  like  to  say  "  young  ones.") 

"  Seven." 

"  Do  you  expect  to  be  free  ?  " 

"  Yes,  sir ;  in  abDut  a  year  our  time  is  up." 

"  Do  you  want  to  be  free  ?  " 

"  Yes,  sir,  I  do." 

Didn't  that  sho^v  the  woman  as  much  as  the  babooness  ?  Not 
being  acquainted  v/ith  the  latter's  method  of  reasoning,  I  cannot  be 
sure,  but  it  struck  lie  as  a  very  familiar  and  conclusive  answer. 

GNATS  AND  CAMELS. 
A  gentleman  in  our  neighborhood  supplied  some  of  the  officers' 
tables  with  milk.  When  Sunday  came  no  milk  came.  He  had  con- 
scientious scruples  about  selling  them  milk  that  day,  .  .  .  yet  he  final- 
ly relented  and  sent  the  milk,  though  he  would  take  no  pay  for  it,  at 
least  on  that  day.  Yet  this  gentleman  was  a  secessionist  slave- 
holder, and  had  secured  a  valuable  and  beautiful  estate,  I  under- 
stand, chiefly  through  the  sale  of  human  flesh.  The  father  of  one  of 
his  slaves  had  vainly  offered  this  high-toned  man  thirteen  hundred 
dollars  for  his  slave  daughter,  a  beautiful  girl  of  sweet  sixteen. 


228 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Will  not  that  do  for  a  modern  illustration  of  the  ancient  gnat  and 
camel  text  ?  A  man  that  would  not  sell  milk  on  Sundays,  and  would 
not  sell  a  father  his  own  daughter,  would  sell  a  score  or  two  of  his 
brothers  and  sisters  into  hopeless  bondage,  and  with  their  blood  and 
bones  live  in  elegance  and  abundance !  What  if  I  should  cap  the 
climax  of  this  narrative  by  telling  you  that  this  conscientious  soul- 
trader  and  soul-holder  is  a  minister  of  our  Lord  and  Saviour  Jesus 
Christ  ?  It  is  even  so.  He  is  the  elected  guide  and  guardian  of  the 
morals  and  piety  of  a  very  influential  portion  of  this  community  ; 
and  what  is  most  astonishing,  not  the  least  objection  is  ever  thought 
of  for  this  conduct.  I  heard  of  some  ladies  who  refused  to  attend  on 
his  worship  because  he  was  a  secessionist ;  I  heard  others  complain 
because  he  was  too  convivial  in  his  habits  ;  but  I  heard  nobody  find 
fault  with  him  for  holding,  selling,  or  refusing  to  sell,  these  children 
of  a  common  Father,  brothers  and  sisters  of  a  common  Saviour. 

I  often  looked  at  his  tasty  chapel,  but  could  not  make  up  my  mind 
to  desecrate  the  Sabbath  by  attending  on  his  ministrations.  But 
happening  to  be  at  a  Quarterly  Conference  of  our  own  spotless  and 
wrinkleless  Church,  where  two  slave-holders  were  nominated  by  the 
preacher  in  charge  for  stewards,  and  elected  unanimously,  without  so 
much  as  an  "  affectionate  admonition  "  from  the  excellent  presiding 
elder,  I  thought  I  was  myself  getting  into  the  gnat-straining  condition 
by  over-scrupulousness.  So  I  concluded,  being  with  the  Romans,  to 
do  as  they  did,  and  see  how  near  this  worthy  rector  and  I  came  to 
worshiping  the  same  God. 

Do  you  wish  to  know  how  he  looked  and  spoke  ?  Descriptions  of 
such  persons  will  be  curiosities  of  literature  eagerly  perused  by  future 
generations.  This  was  a  true  successor  of  the  apostles.  No  broken 
chain  of  descent  was  his,  joined  together  by  martyrial  hands,  and,  per- 
chance, by  those  of  laymen  even,  often  completely  sundered,  or  united 
only  by  that  unseen,  and  hence,  for  ecclesiastical  purposes,  useless 
Spirit  of  God,  that  carried  the  Church  into  the  wilderness  and 
supported  her  there.  No  ;  the  bright  links,  clear  and  defined,  and 
often  of  the  finest  gold,  as,  for  instance,  Alexander  Borgia,  Leo 
X.,  Laud,  and  a  host  of  olhers,  of  whom  not  this  world  nor  any 


Chaplain  Haven. 


229 


other  was  worthy,  glittered  in  the  chain  that  bound  this  servant  to 
his  Master. 

You  expect  a  hard-featured,  hard-voiced,  hard-mannered  man, 
with  tones  Uke  the  snapping  of  a  slave-whip,  and  the  manners  of  a 
Haley  and  Legree  combined.  You  don't  understand  human  nature. 
So  many  paint  Nero,  who  was  really  the  most  elegant  gentleman  of 
his  age.  We  must  remember  that  only  in  the  other  world  does  the 
inner  nature  body  itself  forth  in  the  outer  form.  Here  the  reverse  is 
apt  to  be  true.  The  finest  natures  are  hidden  in  the  least  expressible 
forms,  and  the  vilest  are  not  unfrequently,  like  Burr  and  Mephistoph- 
eles,  witty,  wise,  and  polished,  handsome,  gay,  and  sober,  perfect 
men  in  the  worldly  sense  of  perfection. 

The  preacher  aforesaid  is  a  middle-aged,  gray,  and  bald-headed 
gentleman,  of  pleasant  address,  with  a  quiet,  gentle,  soft,  pathetic 
tone  and  manner.  I  never  had  heard  the  service  read  so  beautifully. 
It  had  a  melting  cadence  that  ghded  into  your  secret  heart.  There 
was  none  of  the  hard  and  formal  style  of  the  mere  reader,  none  of 
the  airs  of  the  rhetorician,  but  a  subdued  grace,  yet  full  of  life,  that 
was  very  fascinating.  With  the  constant  undertone  of  my  moral 
nature  conflicting  with  the  sounds  that  met  my  ear,  I  could  not  but 
feel,  as  he  read  it,  a  new  and  richer  quality  in  that  admirable  serv- 
ice. ^  Yet  how  some  of  the  sentences  he  read  startled  me  !  I  could 
but  think  of  the  mediaeval  legend  of  the  wonderful  preacher,  who, 
arrayed  in  black  vestments,  swept  his  audience  with  most  pathetic 
and  powerful  appeals,  and  after  he  had  left  them  they  found  it  was 
the  archfiend  himself  who  had  been  thus  lifting  them  up  to  heaven. 
These  were  some  of  the  solemn  phrases  that  thrilled  me  so  strange- 
ly, while  he  plaintively  uttered  them,  and  I  fervently  followed  him  : 

"  '  We  sinners  do  beseech  thee  to  hear  us,  O  Lord  God  ;  and  that  it 
may  please  thee  to  show  thy  pity  upon  all  prisoners  and  captives  ; 
that  it  may  please  thee  to  defend  and  provide  for  the  fatherless  chil- 
dren and  widows,  and  all  that  are  desolate  and  oppressed.  O  God, 
merciful  Father,  thou  despisest  not  the  sighing  of  a  contrite  heart, 
nor  the  desire  of  such  as  are  sorrowful ;  mercifully  assist  our  prayers 
that  we  make  before  thee,  in  all  our  troubles  and  adversities,  when- 


230 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


soever  they  oppress  us,  and  graciously  hear  us,  that  those  evils  which 
the  craft  and  subtilty  of  the  devil  or  man  worketh  against  us  may  be 
brought  to  naught ;  that  thy  servants,  being  hurt  by  no  persecutions, 
may  evermore  give  thanks  unto  thee  in  thy  Holy  Church,  through 
Jesus  Christ  our  Lord.'  "  In  the  psalms  for  the  day  he  read  these 
v^ords :  "  '  Save  me  and  deliver  me  from  the  hand  of  strange  chil- 
dren, whose  mouth  talketh  vanity,  and  their  right  hand  is  a  right 
hand  of  iniquity.  .  .  .  That  there  be  no  leading  into  captivity,  and 
no  complaining  in  our  streets.  .  .  .  The  Lord  looseth  men  out  of 
prison.    The  Lord  helpeth  them  that  are  fallen.'  " 

His  sermon  was  a  practical  discourse  on  a  Christian's  trials,  and 
the  comforts  which,  through  the  Spirit,  he  can  extract  from  them. 
...  I  was  anxious  to  preach  a  short  sermon  to  him  on  the  text  that 
was  printed  around  the  stained  window  in  the  chancel,  "  Repent  ye, 
for  the  kingdom  of  heaven  is  at  hand."  I  presume  I  should  have 
shocked  the  audience  more  than  the  rude  Baptist  did  his  hearers  if  I 
had  read  that  third  chapter  of  St.  Matthew,  and  given  it  its  needed 
and  divine  application.  I  could  not  keep  my  eyes  off  that  text.  I 
thought,  it  is  not  possible  for  this  congregation  to  worship  here  and 
be  unmindful  of  its  meaning.  Yet  I  was  probably  the  only  person 
that  ever  saw  it  w-ho  read  it  in  this  true  and  solemn  light.  Thank 
God,  the  kingdom  of  heaven  is  at  hand.  .  .  .  The  march  of  events 
in  the  political,  the  religious,  the  social  world,  all  show  that  He  is 
soon  to  appear  w^ho  will  unloose  these  heavy  burdens  and  let  the 
oppressed  go  free,  and  break  every  yoke. 

Mr.  Haven  had  a  good  deal  of  conversation  with 
Methodists  —  people,  official  niembers,  and  preachers, 
and  he  seems  to  try  hard  to  get  at  their  real  feelings 
about  slavery  and  its  kindred  topics.  Some  citations 
will  show  how  he  managed  this  : 

I  preached  Sunday  morning  to  the  little  Methodist  congregation 
in  the  village.  I  kept  my  regimentals  on,  and  made  an  odd  appear- 
ance.   Have  had  pleasant  intercourse  with  Brother  M.,  the  preacher 


Cpiaplain  Haven. 


231 


here.  He  is  bitterly  prejudiced  against  the  blacks  as  brethren  and 
equals.  The  Washington  brethren  I  met  at  Shepherd's  book-store 
were  much  m.ore  liberal  in  their  feelings. 

Attended  on  Thursday  a  delightful  prayer-meeting  in  the  village 
church.  It  was  a  lovely  moonlight  night.  The  meeting  was  spir- 
itual and  precious,  and  I  thought  of  the  meetings  I  had  enjoyed  on 
Thursday  evenings  at  my  former  homes.  After  meeting  we  walked 
to  the  railroad  and  had  a  talk  on  slavery.  I  talked  as  plainly  as  I 
could  of  its  wrong  and  sin,  of  the  old  Maryland  Methodist  position 
and  their  present  duty.  John  Brown's  name  was  mentioned.  I  did 
not  fail  to  explain  and  defend  his  idea.  He  was  known  around  here. 
Brother  Newton,  a  good  Methodist,  and  a  blacksmith,  says  he  shod 
his  horse  the  summer  before  the  famous  invasion.  He  was  full  of 
Scripture  and  strong  against  slavery.  When  asked  by  Brother 
Newton's  son  where  he  came  from,  he  said  he  was  often  asked  that 
question,  and  always  answered  "  From  every  place  he  had  ever  been 
in  before." 

After  service  I  went  home  with  a  Brother  D.,  a  trustee  and  class- 
leader,  a  very  pleasant  and  worthy  man.  We  had  a  delightful  sup- 
per of  strawberries  and  cream  and  coffee.  He  is  opposed  to  slavery, 
and  yet  fears  to  say  so.  That  is  the  condition  of  many  here.  I  went 
with  him  to  the  church  and  preached  on  "  And  they  overcame  him 
by  the  blood  of  the  Lamb  and  the  word  of  their  testimony."  Rev. 
xii,  II.  I  was  enabled  to  speak  plainly  of  their  duty  in  respect  to  / 
great  social  wrongs.  They  understood  me,  and  some  were  greatly  j 
frightened  lest  I  should  go  too  far.  I  restrained  myself  out  of  con- 
sideration for  their  feelings,  as  I  was  not  invited  to  speak  on  that 
theme.  I  do  not  doubt  that  these  stationed  preachers  could,  had 
they  the  courage,  abolish  slavery  in  this  State  within  five  years.  I 
trust  this  movement  will  give  them  the  needful  courage. 

Went  with  Brothers  M.  and  D.  to  see  Brother  Shipley,  who  owns 
a  fine  farm  on  one  of  the  high  hills.  We  had  a  pleasant  walk, 
though  caught  in  a  shower,  along  the  river,  under  the  trees,  and  by 
a  winding  road  to  the  lofty  house.  The  house  is  large  and  comfort- 
able, and  the  couple  pleasant  people,  who  had  become  rich  by  in- 


232 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


dustry  and  frugality,  and,  best  of  all,  by  free  labor.  I  complimented 
him  for  that,  but  he  felt  no  interest  in  such  affairs.  He  managed  to 
keep  himself  aloof  from  the  controversy— as  shrewd  a  business  Yan- 
kee as  I  have  seen  out  here. 

Friday  night  I  had  a  long  and  earnest  conversation  with  a  slave- 
holder, having  eight  slaves.  He  had  told  several  of  our  men  that  he 
would  free  the  slaves  if  any  body  would  guarantee  their  being  well 
taken  care  of.  He  said  to  me  that  he  had  offered  to  sell  them  for  a 
sixpence  apiece.  _  I  told  him  I  would  give  him  that  for  them,  give 
him  ample  bonds  for  their  good  treatment,  and  an  annual  statement 
of  their  condition.  "  O,"  said  he,  "  I  mean  on  condition  that  they 
be  sent  to  Africa."  He  hated  the  African,  and  agreed  with  Mr.  La- 
trobe  that  he  must  be  expelled  from  the  country.  How  wicked  !  I 
talked  very  plainly  with  this  poor  sinner,  and  hope  it  did  him  some 
good.  He  invited  me  to  come  and  see  him.  O  that  he  might  be 
converted  and  bring  forth  fruits  meet  for  repentance  ! 

Sunday  afternoon  I  attended  class-meeting.  A  Brother  Peacock 
was  present.  He  talked  like  a  Christian,  and,  I  am  sure,  only  needs 
proper  training  from  the  ministers  to  be  free  from  this  sin.  I  shall 
talk  in  future  more  fully  with  him. 

Went  to  Baltimore  with  Brother  M.  We  fell  in  with  Dr.  B.  He 
said  to  M.,  while  we  were  eating  creams  together,  and  M.  said  that 
his  own  father,  a  large  slave-holder,  had  been  talking  with  him  about 
so  disposing  of  his  property  as  not  to  leave  him  the  slaves. 

"  You  didn't  tell  him  to  do  so,  did  you  ?  " 

"  No,  sir,  no,  sir." 

Said  Dr.  B.,  "  Keep  them  ;  hold  them  as  yours." 

I  should  not  have  been  more  shocked  to  have  heard  him  say, 
"  Kill  them."  It  seemed  like  Fagin  training  the  Artful  Dodger. 
What  Christians  ! 

To-day  I  was  at  Quarterly  Conference.  Heard  Brother  M.  nom- 
inate a  slave-holder  for  steward  ;  he  was  elected.  He  invited  us 
home  to  dinner.  I  told  him  I  would  gladly  congratulate  him  on  his 
election  if  he  w^ould  free  his  slaves.  The  ministers  laughed,  but  did 
not  advise  him  to  emancipate  the  slaves.    Spent  the  afternoon  talk- 


Chaplain  Haven. 


233 


ing  with  these  brethren  and  Brother  E.  about  this  matter.  They  are 
far  behind  their  fathers.  Brother  M.,  the  presiding  elder,  told  me 
that  the  old  records  are  full  of  the  trials  and  expulsions  of  slave- 
holders. At  Laight  Street  there  is  a  record  of  the  trial  of  a  man  for 
aiding  another  to  catch  a  runaway  slave.  He  did  not  wish  me  to 
tell  this  on  his  authority. 

What  came  of  all  this  intercourse  with  the  natives 
about  Camp  Essex,  near  the  Relay  House,  is  told  in  a 
few  lines  penned  at  Camp  Andrew,  Baltimore,  a  few 
days  later: 

I  was  very  willing  to  leave  Relay.  I  had  got  tired  of  the  place 
and  the  people.  I  had  been  so  free  in  expressing  my  dislike  of 
slavery  that  some  of  them  threatened  to  string  me  up.  I  don't 
think  they  would  have  done  it ;  but  no  doubt  they  desired  to.  It  is 
a  pleasant  place,  but  crouches  like  Issachar  beneath  the  burdens  of 
fear  of  the  slave  power  and  its  contempt. 

At  Baltimore  he  pursued  the  same  way  of  life  that 
he  had  done  at  the  Relay  House  ;  the  Journal  tells  the 
story : 

Tuesday  I  took  tea  with  Brother  Cook,  and  Wednesday  with 
Brother  Jarboe,  where  I  spent  the  night.  We  got  into  very  earnest 
talks  on  the  slavery  question.  I  always  silenced  them  by  going  for 
old-fashioned  Baltimore  Methodism.  They  are  far  removed  from 
the  faith  of  their  fathers,  and  do  not  like  to  hear  it  spoken  of.  I  told 
a  Brother  B.  to-day  that  every  stone  he  threw  at  New  England 
Abolitionism  shied  off  and  hit  the  graves  of  their  fathers.  Their 
hearts  are  very  hard  on  the  rights,  and  especially  the  equaHty  of  the 
negro.  They  dread  and  fear  him.  I  have  not  heard  them  talk  as  if 
they  really  felt  him  to  be  a  brother.  I  find  I  am  getting  quite  an 
Abolitionist  notoriety.    The  Lord  help  me  to  be  faithful ! 

Yesterday  (July  11)  I  went  to  the  Preachers'  Meeting.    Was  re- 


234 


Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 


ceived  with  cool  cordialit3\  They  seemed  provoked  and  scared. 
Though  they  shook  iny  hand  kindly,  and  once  or  twice  tried  to  make 
conversation  with  me,  still  they  did  not  enjoy  my  presence.  I  don't 
much  blame  them,  for  I  have  said  some  very  plain  and  truthful 
things  about  them  in  the  "Advocate"  and  "Herald."  They  have 
opposed  the  great  antislavery  sentiment  of  the  Church  and  of  their 
fathers,  and  I  tell  them  so  publicly  and  privately. 

I  have  formed  several  pleasant  acquaintances.  Brother  David 
Creamer  and  a  Brother  Beals  are  chief.  I  dined  at  Brother  Cream- 
er's on  the  Fourth,  and  had  a  very  pleasant  and  free  time  on  the 
great  theme.  I  found  Brother  Beals,  an  old  line  Abolitionist,  of 
many  years'  standing ;  he  knew  and  sympathized  with  Torrey,  and 
promised  to  take  me  to  the  cell  where  Torrey  died.  Have  many  in- 
vitations to  visit  and  few  to  preach,  but  shall  preach  to-morrow  for 
Brother  W.  H.  Chapman. 

Friday  I  took  dinner  with  a  Mr.  Kalbfus,  whose  wife  is  a  very 
strong  Union  lady,^and  with  her  I  had  a  full  and  earnest  talk  on  the 
subject  of  slavery.  She  is  a  nice  lady,  and  the  boldest  and  best  I 
have  seen  here. 

Sunday,  July  19,  I  dined  with  Mr.  Moore  and  preached  for  Brother 
Grey.  Brother  W.  H.  Chapman  preached  for  me  a  strong  Union 
sermon.  He  is  the  most  courageous  man  I  have  seen  here  among 
the  ministers.  Mr.  Grey  is  the  only  other  man  who  has  asked  me 
to  preach. 

Of  course,  Mr.  Haven  complied  with  Brother  Grey's 
invitation  to  preach  for  him,  and  the  war  Journal  gives 
some  record  of  it.  But  in  1872,  after  his  election  to  the 
episcopate,  he  again  preached  the  Gospel  in  Baltimore, 
and  was  tempted  to  record  this  preaching  for  Brother 
Grey  eleven  years  earlier  at  some  length  : 

Preached  at  Madison  Square  to  a  large  congregation  ;  had  a  free, 
and,  I  trust,  not  profitless,  time,  as  the  people  were  very  attentive.  It 
seemed  strange  to  reflect  that  the  last  time  I  had  preached  in  that 


Chaplain  Haven. 


235 


city  was  on  this  very  anniversary,  the  first  of  them,  the  original  Bull 
Run  Sunday,  July  21,  1861.  I  preached  then  under  pecuHar  circum- 
stances. I  was  at  Preachers'  Meeting  the  Monday  before,  and,  talk- 
ing with  the  ministers,  taunted  them  for  their  cowardice  ;  said  they 
dare  not  speak  for  the  Union,  yet  if  the  soldiers  all  left,  they  had 
compromised  themselves  too  much  to  stay,  and  would  follow  by  the 
next  train.  ■  After  I  had  done  my  foolish  talking,  a  young  man 
stepped  up  and  asked  me  to  preach  for  him,  saying  I  might  preach 
Massachusetts  Methodism  or  Maryland  Methodism.  I  told  him  I 
preached  no  State  Methodism,  but  would  be  glad  to  preach  for  him 
the  next  Sunday  evening :  he  would  find  me  at  the  Sharp  Street 
Colored  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  which  I  had  promised  to  at- 
tend with  Brother  Jarboe. 

He  came  for  me  and  took  me  to  his  church  in  a  buggy,  saying,  "  I 
hope  you  will  not  say  any  thing  about  slaveiy.  It  is  a  new  mission, 
and  we  have  the  field.  Our  folks  are  Episcopalians,  Presbyterians, 
and  all  kinds ;  and  we  do  not  wish  to  offend  them." 

I  said,  "  I  do  not  know  yet  what  I  shall  preach." 

"  And  I  wish  you  wouldn't  pray  for  the  President,"  he  added. 

"  Let  me  get  out,"  I  said.  "  I  never  yet  was  in  a  place  where  I 
had  not  freedom  in  prayer.    I'll  go  back  to  my  quarters." 

"  Don't  do  it,"  he  rephed  warmly.  "  But  you  don't  know  how 
much  courage  it  requires  here  to  ask  a  man  with  a  chaplain's  uni- 
form on  to  preach  at  all." 

I  savv^  he  had  been  courageous  in  a  measure,  and  said,  "  You  may 
do  your  own  praying." 

He  accepted  the  compromise,  and  I  opened  the  service.  I  crept 
out  of  the  little  box  and  let  him  creep  in  to  pray.  I  felt  my  heart 
hot  within  me  at  the  insult  I  was  receiving,  and  asked  earnestly  for 
help  to  tell  them  the  whole  truth.  The  text,  a  favorite  one  with  me, 
then  came  to  me :  "  When  the  time  was  come  that  he  should  be  re- 
ceived up,  he  steadfastly  set  his  face  to  go  to  Jerusalem."  Luke  ix,  51. 
The  subject  was  moral  courage  in  the  face  of  known  perils.  It 
was  illustrated  by  the  beginnings  of  all  Church  life — Presbyterian, 
Episcopalian,  and  Methodist.    It  was  shown  that  thus  only  could 


236 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


there  be  real  origin  of  life.  It  was  facing  evils  about  them,  and  not 
afar  off;  and  the  brothers  across  the  river,  then  contending  for  their 
country,  were  introduced  as  illustrations.  The  Lord  helped  me, 
and  I  had  a  very  free  field. 

After  I  had  done,  the  leading  man  thanked  me  for  my  sermon,  and 
asked  me  to  go  home  to  tea.  It  was  a  Mr.  Hiss,  a  brother  to  the 
son-in-law  of  Bishop  Ames.  The  preacher,  Brother  Grey,  also 
thanked  me. 

"  Couldn't  I  have  talked  about  slavery  ?  "  I  asked. 
"You  could  have  said  any  thing,"  he  replied. 
"  Then  you  say  it,"  I  replied. 

He  sometimes  got  a  very  decided  taste  of  a  difTerent 
state  of  feeling.  He  went  with  David  Creamer  to  call  on 
the  Dr.  B.  whom  he  had  heard  advising  a  minister  to 
accept  a  legacy  of  slaves  as  his  own,  and  hold  them  in 
bondage. 

We  hired  a  team  and  started  about  ten  o'clock.  We  had  a  pleas- 
ant ride,  and  arrived  at  the  doctor's  about  one.  We  found  him  out, 
and  his  family  any  thing  but  cordial.  They  were  rank  secessionists, 
and  hated  terribly  to  invite  us  to  dinner.  We  were  determined  to 
stay,  and  they  were  obliged  to  relent.  But  we  had  a  very  disagree- 
able time,  though  the  doctor  behaved  decently  at  night  when  we 
talked  thoroughly  on  the  vexed  qnestion. 

I  went  with  Brother  Creamer  to  the  Penitentiary  where  Charles 
T.  Torrey  died.  We  fell  in  with  a  Brother  Roberts,  who  was  a 
keeper  when  Torrey  was  in  the  prison,  and  with  him  when  he  died. 
Mr.  Roberts  said  that  he  died  a  beautiful  Christian  death.  He 
stated  that  the  governor  came  to  the  spot  in  the  partition  opposite 
where  the  prisoner  lay,  but  would  not  come  into  the  cell.  Had  he 
done  so,  and  heard  him  talk,  Roberts  said,  he  couldn't  have  kept 
from  pardoning  him.  The  governor  offered  to  pardon  him  if  Torrey 
would  confess  that  he  had  done  wrong.  This  he  refused.  The 
keeper  urged  Torrey  to  do  this,  saying  that  it  wasn't  much,  and  that 


Chaplain  Haven.  237 

God  would  forgive  him.  But  Torrey  said,  "  No,  much  as  he  wished 
to  die  at  home  and  with  his  family,  he  would  rather  die  a  thousand 
deaths  in  the  Penitentiary  than  confess  that  his  act  was  wrong."  Keeper 
Roberts  said  that  his  eyes  were  fixed  on  the  ceiling  as  he  said  this. 
Thus  he  wore  away  through  sickness  for  more  than  three  years, 
when  he  went  home.  His  hand  was  in  the  hand  of  Keeper  Roberts 
as  he  died.  He  used  to  call  for  his  little  girl,  and  fancied  she  was 
with  him  in  the  broken  hours  before  death.  Brother  Roberts  gave 
me  Torrey 's  pocket  Bible,  which  either  the  prisoner  or  his  wife  had 
given  him  at  that  time. 

It  will  be  seen  that  Gilbert  Haven  was  as  faithful  to 
the  truth  of  God  and  the  \velfare  of  humanity  among 
slave-holders  and  secessionists  as  he  had  ever  been  in 
any  of  his  New  England  pastorates.  He  had  the  ten- 
derest  charity  for  men  who  had  been  reared  under  the 
evil  influences  of  slave-holding  society.  He  was  prompt 
to  observe  and  honor  every  sign  of  genuine  Christian 
discipleship  in  the  people  around  him.  He  not  only  rec- 
ognized their  piety,  but  acted  always  on  the  assumption 
of  its  genuineness  in  all  his  intercourse  with  them.  He 
had  the  courage  to  point  out  their  sins  or  failures  in  duty 
in  the  confidence  that  they  would  both  hear  and  obey 
his  loving  admonitions.  It  is  plain  that  he  felt  a  real 
pleasure  in  testing  the  power  of  a  faithful  and  fraternal 
exposition  of  the  application  of  Christian  principles  to 
the  relations  of  slaves  and  masters  over  the  latter.  He 
no  doubt  came  to  think  that  the  demoralized  condition 
of  public  opinion  in  the  country,  and  especially  the 
South,  was  largely  the  consequence  of  want  of  patience 
and  fidelity  in  the  Christian  ministry.  He  was  delighted 
to  find  traces  of  the  old  Baltimore  Methodist  antislavery 


238  Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 

feeling  around  him,  but  grieved  over  its  too  general  de- 
cadence or  disappearance. 

When  he  had  returned  home  from  his  chaplaincy,  he 
wrote  two  letters  for  Zion's  Herald,"  under  the  signa- 
ture, A  Bait  imore  Preacher  of  the  Old  Sort,"  wherein 
he  summed  up  liis  notions  concerning  the  relation  of  the 
Baltimore  Conference  to  slavery,  and  the  duties  incum- 
bent on  that  body.  In  this  epistle,  which  is  too  long  to 
be  given  in  full,  he  showed  that  the  number  of  slave- 
holders in  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  in  that  city 
and  Conference  was  proportionately  small ;  and  that 
much  of  the  old  antislavery  leaven  was  at  work  in  those 
religious  societies.  Yet  it  was  true  that  the  small  minor- 
ity of  slave-holding  members  of  the  Church  had  succeeded 
in  reducing  the  pulpit  to  silence  on  that  sin.  Slave- 
holders were  freely  admitted  to  membership  in  the  local 
societies  without  warning  or  rebuke.  This  he  regarded 
as  not  only  a  sin  in  the  administrators  of  the  discipline 
of  the  Church,  but  as  likely  before  long  to  issue  in  break- 
ing down  all  sense  of  the  moral  evil  of  the  system  in  the 
Church  and  the  general  public.  He  knew  perfectly  that 
the. lax  temper  of  the  churches  and  clergy  concerning 
this  subject  would  make  it  doubly  hard  for  those  who 
should  resume  their  lost  zeal  and  exhibit  the  ancient 
strictness.  Yet  he  sincerely  believed  that  Christian  pa- 
tience, love,  and  courage  would  enable  even  a  few  men 
to  revolutionize  that  Conference  and  the  State.  He 
had  that  absolute  and  pure  conviction  on  these  points 
which  gave  him  "  the  strength  of  ten."  He  had  probed 
consciences  enough  in  Maryland  to  know  that  many  an 


Chaplain  Haven.  239 

honest  and  devoted  Christian  had  convictions  and  sor- 
rows enough  over  the  wicked  system,  and  to  beheve 
that  state  of  sentiment  very  wide-spread  and  capable  of 
being  used  for  the  regeneration  of  the  Church  and  the 
State, 

Any  one  who  had  opportunities  for  studying  the  sub- 
ject on  the  spot  in  those  sad  days  before  the  war  will 
have  much  reason  for  agreeing  with  Mr.  Haven.  In 
1856-57  there  certainly  was  a  great  deal  of  this  kind  of 
feeling  in  those  parts  of  Virginia  covered  by  the  old 
Baltimore  Conference.  More  than  one  sojourner  in  that 
region  must  have  found,  as  one  assuredly  did,  a  good 
many  Christian  consciences  tender  concerning  the  posi- 
tion and  fortunes  of  the  slave.  In  a  stay  of  less  than  a 
year  in  such  a  community  it  did  happen  at  least  to  one 
diligent  and  careful  observer,  that  nearly  a  dozen  Chris- 
tian slave-holders  confided  to  him  their  troubles  and 
burdens  of  heart  over  the  condition  of  their  own  slaves 
and  those  of  other  people.  These  people  belonged  to 
all  grades  of  society,  from  people  of  very  ordinary  cir- 
cumstances to  some  of  large  property  and  influential 
position.  It  is  true  that  most  such  persons  were  mem- 
bers of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  yet  some  be- 
longed to  other  Churches  or  to  no  Church. 

It  seemed  to  many  of  those  persons  impossible  to  act 
on  their  convictions  in  their  circumstances  and  under 
the  fearful  entanglements  of  pro-slavery  legislation.  To 
whisper  their  convictions  abroad  would  have  exposed 
them  to  social  proscription  and  persecution  of  a  more 
violent  kind.     Had  pious,  intelhgent,  and  courageous 


240  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

leaders  appeared  in  the  Church,  and  especially  the  min- 
istry, to  champion  these  slumbering  but  intense  convic- 
tions, a  sharp  and  desperate  conflict  would  have  ensued 
which  might  have  resulted  in  revolutionizing  public 
opinion.  But  while  this  question  was  pending  war  sent 
its  fiery  flood  at  once  of  retribution  and  deliverance  over 
all  the  land. 


Newark. 


241 


CHAPTER  XHI. 

NEWARK. 

Clinton  Street-His  Faith— Works-Methodist  PoUty-"  The  Methodist  "-Ecclesi- 
astical Reactions  of  the  War— Returns  to  the  New  England  Conference. 

NEAR  the  close  of  October,  1861,  Mr.  Haven  went 
to  Newark,  New  Jersey,  to  act  as  pastor  of  the  CHn- 
ton  Street  Church,  until  the  session  of  the  Newark  Con- 
ference the  next  March.  This  Church  was  without  a  pas- 
tor, and  the  authorities  learning  that  Mr.  Haven  was  not 
likely  to  renew  his  labors  as  chaplain,  were  very  glad  to 
send  him  to  the  deserted  pulpit.  Soon  after  reaching 
Newark  he  sent  a  report  of  the  new  situation  home: 

I  suppose  you  are  waiting  for  a  bulletin  from  this  new  seat  of  war. 
I  lay  off  New  York  in  a  fog  till  nearly  noon,  got  to  Brooklyn  at  din- 
ner, came  to  Newark  in  the  dark  and  rain,  and  found  comfortable 
quarters  with  a  pleasant,  lively  gentleman,  an  agreeable  talkative 
woman,  and  four  little  children  from  two  years  old  and  upward.  I 
went  to  church  Sunday  morning,  and  found  a  plain  brick  building, 
such  as  is  usual  about  here,  with  side  galleries.  It  was  about  two 
thirds  full.  Went  to  Sunday-school  in  the  afternoon  ;  it  is  large. 
Quite  a  number  of  fine  young  men  belong  to  it  and  the  congregation. 
In  the  evening  the  audience  was  fair,  though  not  so  good  as  in  the 
morning,  such  being  the  custom  here.  The  people  seem  very  cordial 
and  say  I  must  stay.    My  first  social  meeting  comes  off  to-night. 

The  church  has  been  badly  neglected  and  managed.    It  is  run 

down  pretty  low  through  drains  upon  it,  though  it  had  four  hundred 

members  a  year  ago.    Most  of  these  may  be  won  back.    The  chance 
11 


242 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


to  work  is  good,  though  success  is  doubtful.  A  very  fine  stone 
Gothic  church  is  close  beside  it,  with  a  popular  preacher  who  draws 
on  this  greatly.    I  shall  be  thankful  if  I  keep  my  folks  at  home. 

People  here  feel  indignant  at  the  Government,  and  are  getting 
ready  for  one  war-cr>'— Emancipation  !  My  sentiments  are  full 
cool  enough,  though  I  was  told  that  several  moderates  were  in  my 
congregation.  The  sermon  and  prayer,  not  a  little  antislavery, 
were  very  acceptable  to  them. 

Mr.  Haven  was  an  admirable  person  to  take  charge 
of  a  Church  under  such  circumstances.  His  cheerfulness 
was  contagious,  his  zeal  kindled  up  zeal  in  all  in  con- 
tact with  him,  and  his  hopefulness  made  hard  things 
seem  easy  to  disheartened  souls.  He  knew  that  work 
and  success  in  working  are  the  best  methods  for  bright- 
ening the  atmosphere  in  any  Church.  Six  weeks  later 
he  writes  to  his  sister  Hannah : 

Perhaps  you  have  been  expecting  me  home,  but  it  will  not  do  to 
leave.  There  is  no  especial  interest  to  keep  me,  but  the  people 
begin  to  feel  comfortable,  the  congregation  is  fair,  and  an  inter- 
regnum would  be  injurious.  We  raised  $400  for  the  missionary 
cause,  which  surprised  every  body,  and  is  considered  far  the  best 
subscription  in  the  city  Churches.  Only  two  surpassed  us,  and  they 
are  very  wealthy  and  flourishing ;  so  we  begin  to  hold  up  our  heads. 
The  congregation  is  much  larger,  and  we  have  had  well  attended 
meetings  every  night  this  week,  with  one  conversion. 

Things  moved  along  very  pleasantly  and  with  good 
success  at  Clinton  Street  until  the  end  of  the  Conference 
year.  He  had  serious  misgivings  as  to  the  fruitfulness 
of  his  labors  there,  on  political  grounds.  He  was  an  Ab- 
olitionist of  the  most  pronounced  character  and  an  open 
defender  of  the  cause  of  heroic  John  Brown,  while  some 


Newark.  243 

of  the  leading  men  at  Clinton  Street  were  quite  con- 
servative in  politics.  It  had  been  hinted  to  him  by 
some  of  those  officious  souls,  who  are  always  on  the 
alert  to  take  charge  of  a  minister's  conscience,  that  he 
had  better  be  guarded  in  dealing  with  political  questions 
and  social  reform.  The  only  effect  of  these  warnings 
was  to  make  him  extra  kind  as  well  as  extra  faithful  in 
handling  such  subjects. 

Some  who  had  uttered  such  admonitions  were  not  a 
little  shocked  and  grieved  to  observe  the  deliberate 
way  in  which  he  ignored  their  counsels.  These  timid 
advisers  were  greatly  startled  to  learn  that  on  the  ninth 
of  March,  with  the  Conference  just  at  hand,  Mr.  Haven 
had  welcomed  President  Lincoln's  first  public  step  for 
the  abolition  of  slavery  with  an  eloquent,  solemn  and 
thoughtful  discourse  on  the  text,  "  The  year  of  my  re- 
deemed is  come."  Isa.  Ixiii,  4.  This  sermon  was  the  oc- 
casion of  some  remark  in  the  local  press,  and  made  some 
stir  in  Methodist  circles  in  Newark.  It  is  a  thoroughly 
faithful  discourse,  and  one  of  those  afterward  included 
in  his  "  National  Sermons."  Mr.  Haven's  presiding 
elder  heard  a  hostile  account  of  it,  and  told  the  preacher 
that  after  such  a  discourse  he  could  not  succeed  in 
Newark.  But  the  faithful  pastor  then  had  in  his  pocket 
a  unanimous  invitation  from  the  official  board  to  return 
there  the  next  year,  and  knew  that  a  committee  had 
been  appointed  to  urge  the  elder  to  procure  his  further 
services  in  their  pastorate ;  so  that  he  could  afford  to 
smile  somewhat  contemptously  at  such  timid  advisers. 
The  society  had  been  so  well  pleased  with  his  devotion 


244  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

and  success  that  they  were  quite  anxious  for  his  re-ap- 
pointment. He  would  have  stayed  w  ith  pleasure  had  not 
thoughts  of  his  motherless  children  drawn  him  again  to 
New  England. 

While  in  Newark  this  busy  thinker  foi^nd  a  chance  to 
stir  up  some  excitement  over  certain  Church  questions. 
He  was  conservative  on  nearly  all  the  ecclesiastical 
questions  then  under  discussion,  except  lay  delegation. 
It  chanced  that  Rev.  Hiram  Mattison  had  just  seceded 
from  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  published  the 
story  of  his  grievances,  his  criticisms  on  the  polity  and 
workings  of  the  body  he  had  deserted,  hid  become  pas- 
tor of  an  independent  Methodist  Church  in  New  York, 
and  was  looking  about  him  for  allies.  Rev.  Newton 
Heston,  whose  unexpired  term  of  service  Mr.  Haven 
was  filling  out  at  Clinton  Street,  had  made  an  arrange- 
ment to  go  to  Brooklyn,  and  been  greatly  angered  when 
the  Bishop,  not  recognizing  the  arrangement,  had  re- 
turned him  to  Newark.  He,  too,  was  called  to  the  pas- 
torate of  an  independent  Methodist  Church  in  Brooklyn, 
and  made  light  of  his  appointment  to  Newark.  A  cry 
w^ent  abroad  that  this  was  a  sign  and  tok^n  of  a  general 
disintegration  of  the  Methodist  body. 

These  events  gave  Mr.  Haven  an  opportunity  to  free 
his  mind  on  these  subjects  that  was  not  unwelcome. 
He  punctured  the  absurdities  and  mistakes  of  the  se- 
ceders  without  mercy.  But  he  looked  upon  their  move- 
ments as  the  outgrowth  of  a  dangerous  state  of  feeling 
in  large  and  influential  sections  of  the  Church  in  those 
regions.    Just  at  the  same  time,    The  Methodist,"  an 


Newark.  245 

independent  Methodist  newspaper,  was  getting  under 
way  in  New  York.  He  describes  the  visible  leader  of 
the  new  journal  as  a  good  hater,  seeking  the  strength 
that  comes  from  organization  and  numbers,  having  "  an 
I-turn-the-crank-of-the-universe  air,"  holding  a  sort  of 
private  general  conference  near  the  regular  one  at  Buf- 
falo, and  as  being  at  heart  hostile  to  the  Church.  He 
shows  that  the  Stilwellite,  Methodist  Protestant,  Scottite, 
and  Southern  s(icessions  had  all  been  preceded  by  similar 
antecedents,  and  predicts  a  similar  result  in  this  in- 
stance.   He  sa}'s  of  the  new  paper  : 

It  is. striving  in  every  possible  way  to  supplant  the  "Advocate." 
It  offers  great  bribes  in  its  columns,  it  sends  out  the  most  untiring 
and  unscrupulous  agents  ;  it  dispatches  secret  circulars  to  some  of 
the  preachers,  offering  them  a  dollar  apiece  for  each  subscriber.  It 
also  sends  circulars  to  postmasters  and  sympathetic  outsiders 
marked  "strictly  confidential,"  offering  them  seventy-five  cents  on 
every  subscriber,  thus  tempting  them  to  go  among  our  brethren  and 
steal  away  the  pat  -ons  of  the  regular  journals.  This  is  all  done  to 
get  a  position  superior  to  the  appointed  organs  and  managers  of  our 
interests,  and,  backed  by  its  army  of  supporters,  to  dictate  terms  of 
submission  to  the  whole  Church. 

Seeing  these  things  are  so,  it  astonishes  us  conservatives  that  any  of 
our  Bishops  can  permit  their  sermons  to  be  published  in  its  columns, 
and  otherwise  seen  to  give  it  aid  and  comfort. 

"  The  wise  man  shook  his  head, 
And  to  himself  he  said, 
This  is  indeed  beyond  my  comprehension," 

Their  success  is  dubious.  If  successful  it  will  only  prepare  the 
way  for  haughtier  demands  at  the  next  General  Conference,  with 
threats  of  and  arrangements  for  secession,  if  these  are  not  complied 
with. 


246 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Mr.  Haven  did  not  regard  the  influence  of  "The 
Methodist "  as  responsible  for  the  secessions  that  had 
taken  place  here  and  there  in  the  case  of  single  pastors 
and  Churches,  but  with  these  as  symptomatic  of  a  general 
condition  of  disturbed  loyalty  in  the  regions  about  New 
York.  Nor  did  he  regard  independent  journalism  as  in 
itself  an  evil  in  the  Church ;  but  he  did  regard  the  new 
paper  as  the  outgrowth  of  feelings  of  disappointment 
and  hostility.  He  thought  it  likely  to  seek  support  by 
too  great  sympathy  with  defeated  principles  and  unsuc- 
cessful candidates,  and  with  reforms  of  doubtful  utility 
to  the  Connection.  He  feared  lest  the  fine  talents,  sin- 
cere devotion  and  high  character  of  many  of  the  movers 
in  the  business  should  prove  too  weak  to  keep  the 
paper  from  becoming  a  sort  of  cave  of  Adullam  in  our 
Israel,  and  its  head  like  David  in  that  cave,  where  every 
one  that  was  discontented  gathered  themselves  unto 
him  ;  and  he  became  a  captain  over  them." 

It  is  certain  that  all  the  results  he  dreaded  have  not 
shown  themselves,  but  Mr.  Haven  contended  that  this 
was  the  result  of  unfavorable  movements  of  the  public 
mind.  For  one  thing  the  Civil  War  had  settled  all  the 
contentions  concerning  slavery  and  its  relations  to  the 
Church  in  their  earlier  forms.  The  war  for  the  Union  had 
produced  a  wide-spread  atmosphere  of  feeling  which  was 
favorable  to  the  development  of  new  and  the  strength- 
ening of  old  bands  of  union  throughout  the  country. 
This  made  itself  silently  but  powerfully  felt  in  all  eccle- 
siastical matters. 

Mr.  Haven  never  changed  his  views  of  the  unhealthy 


Newark. 


247 


influence  of  that  sheet  upon  our  affairs.  He  looked  with 
suspicion  upon  the  readiness  with  which  certain  sorts 
of  reform  were  welcomed  in  that  quarter.  He  even 
regarded  its  advocacy  of  Lay  Representation  as  a  hin- 
derance  to  the  good  cause,  because  it  would  provoke 
suspicion  or  hostility  in  many  upright  people,  as  if  the 
taint  of  disloyalty  must  be  there.  As  late  as  the  last 
year  of  life  he  still  retained  such  views.  The  night  be- 
fore the  opening  of  the  session  of  the  New  York  East 
Conference,  in  1879,  spent  with  the  writer.  He  con- 
versed freely  about  all  Church  questions  and  indicated 
some  of  the  suggestions  he  intended  to  urge  upon  its 
ministers  during  the  Conference  session. 

The  question  of  an  indefinite  extension  of  the  term  of 
pastoral  service  was  then  under  debate  in  the  journals  of 
the  denomination.  "  The  Methodist  "  favored  and  cham- 
pioned the  movement.  The  Bishop  regarded  the  pro- 
posal as  one  of  the  most  perilous  which  could  be  made, 
because  he  held  that  it  would  be  in  effect  a  surrender 
of  our  itinerancy.  It  was  understood  that  the  subject 
would  be  brought  before  the  Conference,  and  the  Bishop 
was  alive  to  the  very  teeth  with  argument  and  raillery 
against  it.  Great  was  his  joy  when  the  movement  was 
defeated  by  a  very  large  vote.  Yet  he  never  failed  to 
speak  of  it  as  an  offshoot  of  the  old  mischievous  leaven 
of  "  The  Methodist." 


248 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

IN  EUROPE. 

Travels  in  Europe— Correspondence — Dr.  Gumming— Punshon  and  Spurgeon— Palm- 
erston  and  Disraeli— Wayside  Talks— Caste  in  the  Grave— St.  Germain  des  Pros— Letter 
to  the  London  Watchman — Its  Reception  in  England. 

IN  April,  1862,  Gilbert  Haven  was  stationed  at  Mai- 
den ;  but  it  was  understood  that  the  pulpit  would  be 
supplied  by  Dr.  E.  O.  Haven,  while  the  nominal  pastor 
would  be  seeking  rest  and  recuperation  in  European 
travel.  He  sailed  at  once  on  the  steamer  Canada,  and 
during  the  ensuing  ten  months  visited  England,  Scot- 
land, France,  Switzerland,  Germany,  Italy,  Greece, 
Egypt,  and  Palestine.  So  rapid  a  traveler  must  have 
been  dependent  mainly  upon  his  previously  acquired 
information  for  the  advantages  of  travel ;  he  had  not 
time  to  study  as  he  went  along  any  thing  but  the  spec- 
tacles of  nature,  society,  and  historical  scenes,  spread  in 
such  swift  and  rich  succession  before  him. 

But  in  spite  of  the  rapidity  of  his  journeyings  and  the 
powerful  attraction  of  European  scenes  and  society,  he 
found  time  for  a  series  of  letters,  some  of  them  full  and 
elaborate,  to  the  various  friends  he  had  left  behind. 
He  likewise  wrote  incessantly  for  "  The  Christian  Advo- 
cate," The  Northern  Advocate,''  "  Zion's  Herald," 
The  Independent,"  and  the  "  Ladies'  Repository."  It 
would  be  impossible  to  follow  him  in  detail  through 


In  Europe.  249 

this  manifold  record  of  his  wanderings  in  the  Old 
World.  He  collected  the  most  .interesting  of  these  pict- 
ures of  travel  3.fter  his  return  in  a  volume  called  "  Pil- 
grim's Wallet."  It  is  true  that  he  did  not  half  exhaust 
his  materials,  and  always  cherished  the  intention  of  work- 
ing up  a  second  volume  to  include  his  papers  on  Italy, 
Greece,  Egypt,  and  Palestine.  That  he  never  carried 
out  this  plan  came  partly  from  the  many  claims  on  his 
time  and  pen  which  soon  arose,  partly  from  the  fact 
that  the  public,  though  fairly  appreciative  of  his  work, 
was  not  so  eager  as  to  challenge  to  further  production, 
and  chiefly  from  a  doubt  whether  he  could  make  the 
second  volume  as  appetizing  as  the  first. 

He  had  some  of  the  qualities  which  render  traveling 
abroad  anywhere  interesting  and  instructive.  He  had  a 
very  quick  eye  for  the  world  around  him,  and  rare  skill 
in  reproducing  it  in  his  animating  sentences.  He  saw 
all  that  the  eye  could  see,  and  his  eyes  were  always 
open.  He  had  learned  by  instinct  that  there  is  always 
something  worth  seeing,  wherever  there'  is  an  eye  to 
see  the  actual  world.  He  would  paint  a  scene  which 
nobody  had  ever  heard  of  before,  on  the  New  England 
or  Maryland  coast,  with  as  much  care  and  detail  as  the 
most  famous  landscapes  in  the  world.  This  constant 
alertness  of  attention,  while  it  gave  immeasurable  vari- 
ety to  his  writings,  occupied  him  so  fully  that  it  with- 
drew him  from  the  careful  and  studied  portraiture  of 
the  most  important  scenes  and  men.  Yet  he  knew  and 
saw  enough  to  render  his  impressions  of  travel  very 

pleasant  reading.    The  best  way  to  show  his  skill  in 
11* 


250 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


such  matters  will  be  to  quote  from  the  "  Pilgrim's 
Wallet 

ENGLISH  PREACHERS. 

I  heard  Dr.  Cumming  on  Ezekiel's  vision.  The  doctor  is  tallish, 
slim,  very  genteel,  nice  to  softness  in  voice  and  manner ;  pronouncr 
ing  exquisite  exqueeseete,  and  such  hke  Miss  Nancyisms.  Yet  the 
dandy  glove  hides  a  grip  of  steel.  He,  more  than  any  other  I  heard, 
discussed  doctrinal  questions.  This  was  probably  owing  to  his 
Scotch  training  and  auditor}^  He  referred  to  the  "  Essays  and  Re- 
views," denouncing  them  for  their  laxity  on  the  question  of  inspira- 
tion. His  subject  was  the  universal  triumph  of  Christ.  His  mille- 
narian  views  were  dwelt  upon,  and  prophecies  repeated. 

The  conduct  of  France  and  Russia  in  refusing  aid  to  the  Sultan 
in  restoring  the  Holy  Sepulcher  showed  that  they  intended  to  wrest 
it  from  him,  and  he  declared  that  this  would  merge  into  a  religious 
and  universal  war.  A  peaceable  settlement  embarrasses  his  proph- 
ecy. He  had  some  neat  and  novel  thoughts,  and  some  fine  touches 
of  eloquence.  He  is  very  easy  to  hear,  being  purely  conversational ; 
with  no  scrap  of  paper,  but  fervid  talk.  I  was  not  surprised  at  his 
popularity.  Even  that  very  tetidre  would  increase  his  attract- 
iveness. Two  thousand  persons  were  in  his  amphitheater  of  a 
church. 

After  all  London  fame  settles  upon  two  men — Punshon  and  Spur- 
geon.  They  are  ver)^  different  sort  of  men.  Punshon  reminded  me 
of  Bascom  and  Chapin.  He  reads  fast,  has  few  gestures,  is  no  ora- 
tor, at  least  in  the  pulpit,  and  carries  his  crowds  by  the  splendor  of 
his  language  more  than  by  all  other  gifts.  He  rushes  with  such  im- 
petuosity that  you  are  swept  along  as  in  an  express  train.  His  sub- 
ject was  Jeremiah's  complaint  against  the  Jews  for  hewing  out  to 
themselves  cisterns,  broken  cisterns,  that  can  hold  no  water.  Like 
the  others,  it  was  textual,  seizing  each  word  and  showing  its  force 
and  application  ;  addressed  to  the  unconverted  persons  of  a  Chris- 
tian nation.  He  enlarged  on  the  difference  between  the  work  Jere- 
miah and  Paul  had  to  do— one  to  v.-arn,  entreat,  and  lament  a  falling 


In  Europe. 


251 


Church,  the  other  to  build  up  the  Church  out  of  the  ruins  of  hea- 
thendom. His  description  of  the  Jews  was  masterly.  So  was  his 
portrayal  of  the  labor  of  man  to  save  himself ;  hewing  out  to  him- 
self cisterns,  broken  cisterns,  that  can  hold  no  water.  His  sermons 
are  exegetical  orations.  His  house  was  full,  and  were  it  known 
where  he  preached,  the  crowds  would  be  enormous.  He  ought  to 
be  advertised,  unless  he  could  have  a  stated  place,  which  the  Wes- 
leyan  polity  forbids.  He  is  a  large,  full-faced  man,  of  about  forty. 
His  voice  is  pleasant,  but  not  extraordinary.  His  forte  is  in  these 
rushing  tides  of  gorgeous  rhetoric,  not  overflowing,  but  full  to  the 
brim.  Reading  his  sermon  spoils  it  for  oratory,  but  does  not  seem 
to  conflict  with  his  style,  which  might  not  be  helped  but  marred  by 
abandoning  the  manuscript.  He  may  break  away  from  these  inky 
fetters  on  the  platform  ;  if  so,  his  sweep  must  be  grand. 

But  the  pulpit  orator  of  London  is  Spurgeon.  I  confess  to  a  pre- 
vious prejudice  against  him  ;  but  he  disarmed  me.  I  heard  him 
twice,  and  though  I  dislike  to  admit  any  one  into  the  circle  where 
my  three  greatest  preachers  dwell— Olin,  Durbin,  and  Beecher — yet 
I  have  to  acknowledge  he  has  a  seat  beside  if  not  above  them.  He 
has  none  of  the  rhetorical  manners  of  Punshon,  and  yet  he  has  its 
results.  He  is  a  very  remarkable  man  ;  the  greatest  preacher,  I 
think,  that  I  have  ever  heard.  Let  me  try  to  give  you  some  idea  of 
him.  First,  behold  the  field  of  his  conflicts  and  victories.  This  is  a 
handsome  theater,  two  galleries  going  entirely  round  the  house.  In 
front  of  the  first  gallery,  on  a  line  with  it,  projects  a  common  plat- 
form, inclosed  by  a  common  altar  railing.  This  is  his  pulpit.  Half 
way  between  it  and  the  lower  floor  is  a  platform,  in  front  of  the  pul- 
pit, full  of  singers.  He  opens  the  meeting  with  animated  singing, 
then  makes  running,  witty,  and  spiritual  comments  on  his  Scripture 
readings.  He  begins  his  sermon  by  imploring  the  presence  of  the 
Holy  Spirit,  and  through  every  word  and  moment  this  seems  up- 
permost in  his  thoughts.  He  is  very  dramatic,  delighting  to  hold 
imaginary  conversations  with  persons  in  the  house.  The  night  I 
heard  him  he  fancied  himself  preaching  one  of  Paul's  sermons  in  the 
streets  of  Corinth,  to  show  what  the  apostolic  preaching  was,  and  for 


252  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Mteen  minutes  had  entirely  forgotten  tiiat  he  was  aught  else  than 
the  fervent  apostle.  He  refers  to  the  current  heresies  of  the  day, 
and  annihilates  them  at  a  blow.  He  made  light  of  systems  of  divin- 
ity, so  called,  declaring  their  idea  impossible,  and  their  wisdom  fool- 
ishness. Then  he  answered  the  objectors.  This  is  a  good  specimen 
of  the  quickness  of  his  repartee.  A  class  object  to  the  atonement 
because  it  is  so  bloody.  It  smells  of  the  shambles.  "  Of  course  it 
does  !  "  he  exclaimed.  •*  He  shall  be  led  as  an  ox  to  the  shambles.'' 
These  words  give  no  idea  of  the  vehemence  with  which  he  leaps  on 
his  antagonists.  He  was  very  positive  in  his  Calvinism.  Yet,  hold- 
ing an  animated  dialogue  with  an  inquirer  in  the  gallery,  he  makes 
him  ask,  "  How  do  I  know  that  I  may  be  saved  ?  "  "  Do  you  trust 
Him  ?  "  he  exclaims.  "  If  you  do,  you  are  one  of  those  he  has 
bought  with  his  blood."  An  adroit  answer,  though  far  from  the 
demands  of  his  system. 

He  glories  in  the  simplicity  of  his  preaching,  and  seems  to  think 
that  he  is  nothing  remarkable,  but  only  an  earnest,  straightforward 
evangelist,  who  stands  before  sinners, 

"With  cries,  entreaties,  tears,  to  save, 
And  snatch  them  from  a  burning  grave." 

He  differs  from  all  the  great  preachers  I  have  ever  heard  in  this 
singleness  of  aim.  His  every  sermon  is  a  battle,  begun  with  a 
charge  of  bayonets.  His  voice  is  strong  and  pleasant,  except  that  it 
breaks  on  the  high  notes.  He  is  the  perfection  of  English  preach- 
ing, embodying  in  their  finest  expression  all  the  leading  peculiarities 
of  that  school. 

PALMERSTON  AND  DISRAELI. 
Under  the  title,  "A  Night  in  Parliament,"  he  gives 
an  account  of  an  afTray  between  these  once  doughty 
knights  of  the  political  arena : 

The  officials  of  the  government  are  seated  on  the  lowest  bench, 
on  the  right  of  the  speaker ;  the  leaders  of  the  opposition  on  the 


In  Europe. 


253 


opposite  bench  ;  the  Hberal  leaders  across  the  lower  end  of  this  par- 
allelogram, "  below  the  gangway,"  as  it  is  called.  The  mastiffs  from 
the  opposing  benches  carelessly  eye  each  other.  The  upper  dog  in 
the  fight  soon  proceeds  to  open  the  fray.  There  he  sits,  with  his 
hat  pressed  down  over  his  eyes,  his  smallish  form  looking  as  if 
shrunk  with  age,  his  air  that  of  one  half  asleep  and  half  dead.  Sud- 
denly he  arouses  himself,  rises  in  an  utterly  indifferent  and  lazy 
manner,  and  with  the  hesitating  tongue,  which  is  the  sine  qua  7ion 
of  parliamentary  oratory,  throws  a  bombshell  into  the  ranks  of  his 
foes.  He  declares  that  the  question  in  debate  is  confidence  or  no 
confidence  in  the  ministry  ;  if  defeated,  he  shall  resign  and  appeal  to 
the  country.  They  are  seemingly,  perhaps  really,  taken  aback  by 
the  threat,  and  much  preliminary  skirmishing  follows.  He  knows  his 
ground,  evidently,  and  has  chosen  it  with  wise  forecast ;  he  is  not 
to  be  beguiled  from  it.  Even  Disraeli's  cunning  suggestions  do  not 
make  the  craftier  fox  drop  his  prey.  The  debate  opens  with  a 
somewhat  graceful  speech  from  Mr.  Stanstead,  ihe  author  of  the 
motion.  Palmerston  follows.  The  powers  of  the  man  are  coolness 
and  readiness.  His  sajtg  froid  is  extraordinary  even  in  a  Briton. 
It  is  not  the  coolness  of  a  fluent  orator,  for  he  is  any  thing  but 
fluent.  It  is  not  the  sparkling  jets  of  a  ready  debater,  though  in 
these  he  is  not  lacking.  It  is  simply  the  imperturbai)ility  of  the  man 
of  business,  prepared  for  every  emergency  that  his  antagonists  can 
create.  He  is  not  merely  cool  ;  he  is  adroit.  He  knows  what  to 
say  and  what  not  to  say  ;  how  to  conceal  a  thought  while  seeming 
to  express  it.  He  can  utter  a  biting  gibe,  which  is  itself  a  clinching 
argument,  and  this  so  carelessly,  that  he  appears  to  be  the  most  in- 
different person  in  all  the  melee.  His  friends  and  foes  grow  nervous 
beside  his  unchanging  calmness.  "  What's  the  overthrow  of  my  ad- 
ministration ?  "  he.  seems  to  say.  "  Mere  bagatelle."  Others  say, 
"  It  is  infamous  !  it  is  glorious  !  "    He,  '*  It  is  naught,  it  is  naught." 

This  is  the  crowning  gift  of  all  potentates  in  all  spheres — poetic, 
oratorio,  military,  administrative.  The  coolness  of  Phillips,  Grant,  and 
Lincoln  is  among  the  highest  proofs  of  their  greatness.  So  is  that 
of  Palmerston,    The  classical  axiom  does  not  seem  to  fit  his  case-' 


254 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Possunt  quia  posse  videantiir  —  He  is  able  because  he  does  not 
seem  to  be  able. 

To  him  Disraeli  makes  reply.  Opposite  him,  not  twenty  feet  off, 
sat  the  calmly  sneering-  Jew.  He  is  dressed  with  studious  care,  in 
"  an  inky  suit  of  customary  black,"  in  striking  contrast  to  the  seedy 
slouchiness  of  his  rival.  His  dark  face,  large  and  hooked  nose,  and 
smoky  black  eye,  all  mark  his  race  and  nature.  He  essays  a  like 
abandon  ;  but  with  him  the  seeming  is  apparent  to  every  eye.  His 
voice  is  calm,  his  enunciation  measured  ;  he  even  stammers  in  his 
utterance.  Yet  all  these  are  clearly  histrionic  ;  his  calmness,  extem- 
poraneousness,  and  hesitation,  are  all  assumed.  He  is  manifestly 
excited.  Ever)'  nerve  is  strained  to  throw  his  qtiiet  old  enemy,  who 
has  dropped  back  into  his  seat,  with  his  hat  over  his  eyes,  almost 
nodding,  as  if  asleep.  His  speech  is  carefully  elaborated  ;  there  is 
not  a  word  that  has  not  been  carefully  hammered  out  with  assidu- 
ous toil  on  the  studio  anvil.  The  natural  hesitation  of  one  looking 
for  words  wherewith  to  dress  the  poor  naked  idea  that  stands  shiv- 
ering in  his  brain,  is  the  popular  style  of  Parhamentary  oratory,  be- 
cause Parliament  was  not  originally  intended  as  a  congress  of  repre- 
sentatives and  debaters,  but  a  talking  place  of  the  chiefs  of  the 
realm.  This  is  the  proper  meaning  of  its  name  ;  the  distinguishing 
trait  of  the  higher  and  originally  only  house.  They  disdain  to  make 
speeches  ;  they  only  talk.    Hence,  as 

"  When  we  stick  on  conversation's  burrs, 

We  strew  our  pathway  with  those  dreadful  'urrs  ;" 

so  these  gentr}^  in  their  parliamentary  converse,  delight  to  retain 
this  reminiscence  of  the  earlier  colloquiality  that  marked  their  delib- 
erations. Disraeli  knows  that  this  is  the  fashion,  and  strews  the 
pathway  of  his  oratory  with  these  suggestions  of  an  unprepared  and 
half  embarrassed  state  of  mind,  while  they  are  as  carefully  wrought 
as  are  his  most  sarcastic  or  ornate  passages. 

There  is  a  cold,  metallic  ring  of  the  memorite}'  about  his  voice  ; 
he  has  a  Mephistophelian  sneering  running  through  all  iris  speech. 
It  sounds  almost  demoniacal ;  so  constant,  so  intense  is  his  scorn. 


In  Europe.  255 

He  thrusts  home  with  masterly  sharpness  and  brightness,  piercing 
always  the  joints  of  his  enemy's  harness.  How  Palmerston  can  sit 
so  drowsily  under  this  stinging  sarcasm  is  marvelous.  He  hears 
every  word,  he  feels  every  word,  yet  he  sleeps  on.  This  Mac- 
beth cannot  murder  his  sleep.  That  it  hits  his  replies  show  ;  yet  in 
his  replies  he  still  keeps  the  merry  side  out,  and  plants  his  blows  in 
laughter,  making  the  house  ring  and  the  foe  writhe  at  his  telling 
blows. 

While  Mr.  Haven  was  in  Great  Britain  he  enjoyed 
and  improved  one  advantage  which  he  missed  on  the 
Continent — conversation  with  those  around  him.  This 
meant  more  for  him  than  for  most,  since  he  had  the 
deftest  skill  in  making  men  open  their  hearts  and  minds 
to  him  in  way-side  talk.  His  own  heartiness,  abandofi, 
good-will,  and  honesty  of  speech  would  often  draw  taci- 
turn men  from  their  normal  silence.  If  he  desired  to 
find  out  the  opinions  and  desires  of  any  class  of  men 
about  him,  he  was  certain  to  have  abundant  materials 
for  doing  so  in  his  hands.  He  knew  how  to  say  what- 
ever he  wished  to  say  so  as  to  win  a  respectful  hearing, 
and  he  had  rare  tact  in  bringing  the  talk  around  to  any 
point  he  wished  to  touch.  Such  incidents  were  full  of 
meaning  for  him,  for  they  revealed  the  feelings  and  pur- 
poses of  the  real  people.    We  give  an  instance  : 

Before  leaving  Bedford  I  ought  to  chronicle  an  incident  which 
convinced  me  that  the  spirit  of  the  sires  of  England's  great  rebell- 
ion lives  yet  in  her  sons.  I  asked  a  lame  man  where  Bunyan's 
Chapel  was,  and  on  his  directing  me,  remarked  that  I  was  an 
American. 

North  or  South  ?  "  said  he. 

"Neither,"  said  I  ;  "a  United  States  American." 


256 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


"  Why  didn't  you  say  that  before  ?  "  said  he.  "  I  would  have  in- 
troduced you  to  that  large  white-coated  man  going  up  the  other  side 
of  the  street.  He  is  a  great  Union  man  ;  so  am  I.  It  is  the  aris- 
tocracy that  wants  the  Confederacy  acknowledged.  If  they  ac- 
knowledge it,  we  shall  revolt." 

"  Revolt,"  I  answer  ;  "  what  will  that  amount  to  }  They  say  up 
in  London  John  Bright  has  no  friends." 

"  John  Bright,"  he  replies,  "  can  march  more  millions  to  London 
than  they  can  rally  against  him." 

His  eyes  flashed  as  his  soul,  on  fire,  blazed  from  their  windows. 
He  knew  what  "revolt"  meant.  Cromwell  and  his  fellows  had 
taught  him  that. 

Mr.  Haven  was  more  than  forty  when  he  first  visited 
Europe.  Hence  he  was,  perhaps,  a  little  too  prone  to 
weigh  and  estimate  every  thing  in  the  social  and  polit- 
ical world  by  American  standards.  Yet  the  amplest 
admissions  on  this  subject  should  not  blind  us  to  the 
neatness  with  which  he  sometimes  impales  British  fol- 
lies aad  shows  up  British  absurdities,  as  in  the  passages 
to  follow : 

CASTE  IN  THE  GRAVE. 
Descending  the  hill,  we  pass  through  a  new  cemetery  that  gro- 
tesquely exhibits  the  religion  and  the  caste  of  England.  It  is  in  two 
parts.  A  road  runs  between.  Two  handsome  stone  chapels,  just 
alike  apparently,  though  unspeakably  different  in  the  eye  of  a  true 
Churchman,  stand  opposite  each  other  at  the  several  entrances  of 
the  grounds.  One  lot  and  chapel  is  for  Dissenters,  one  for  Church- 
men. A  gentleman  told  me  that  in  a  parish  in  Yorkshire,  where  the 
road  did  not  kindly  cut  off  the  sacred  from  the  accursed  earth,  the 
clerg}'man  refused  to  perform  the  consecrating  services  until  they 
had  built  a  wall  at  least  three  feet  high  and  six  feet  deep  between 
the  parts,  this  depth  being  that  to  which  the  graves  are  dug. 


In  Europe.  257 

Afterward  he  found  a  similar  absurdity  in  the  Chapel 
of  St.  George,  at  Windsor  : 

In  the  center  of  the  aisle,  near  the  altar,  stood  a  large  vase  full  of 
flowers.  They  were  put  there  by  the  Queen's  hand  over  the  vault 
below,  where  her  husband  reposed.  He  could  not  be  allowed,  the 
verger  said,  to  be  buried  there,  as  only  the  blood  royal  or,  more 
properly,  the  dust  royal,  could  sleep  in  this  chapel.  Husband  and 
wife  must  part  company  here,  for  both  cannot  be  of  the  royal  race. 
The  force  of  folly  could  no  farther  go.  Prince  Albert's  children 
could  sleep  here,  but  not  their  father.  The  queen's  father  can  lie 
here,  but  not  her  mother.  How  fine  the  thread  which  holds  this 
system  together  !  One  strong  puff  of  popular  common  sense,  and 
the  whole  aristocratic  cobweb  dissolves,  and 

"  Like  an  unsubstantial  pageant  faded, 
Leaves  not  a  rack  behind." 

One  of  Mr.  Haven's  keenest  delights  in  this  earliest  tour 
in  Europe  was  found  in  inspection  of  the  masterpieces  of 
architecture,  painting,  and  sculpture.  Most  of  his  ideas 
concerning  art  were  derived  from  a  patient  and  loving 
study  of  Ruskin's  works  and  considerable  reading  of 
artist  biographies.  As  his  opportunities  for  the  care- 
ful examination  of  such  artistic  creations  had  been  few 
and  rare,  one  would  naturally  expect  considerable  mod- 
esty and  diffidence  in  his  deliverances  on  such  topics. 
What  can  -be  finer  in  this  particular  than  Hawthorne's 
confessions  of  his  own  helplessness  und^^r  similar  circum- 
stances; but  Mr.  Haven's  manner  is  wholly  different. 
He  runs  through  the  world  of  European  scenery  and 
art  without  the  slightest  conjecture  that  these  multitu- 
dinously  novel  objects  may  possibly  not  reveal  to  him 
their  whole  significance.    The  audacious  mental  poise  of 


258 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


the  man  shows  itself  in  his  total  unconsciousness  of  any 
audacity  in  his  procedures.  He  describes  a  Parisian 
cafe  and  Murillo's  Conception  with  the  same  free  and 
easy  air  of  knowing  all  about  both. 

Of  course,  Mr.  Haven  never  enters  upon  the  realm  of 
technical  art  criticism,  but  confines  himself  to  telling 
what  impressions  these  wonderful  artistic  creations  pro- 
duce on  his  own  mind.  Even  this  is  perilous  for  the 
unlearned  in  art.  Sometimes  the  mark  is  missed  when 
it  is  fairly  plain,  but  commonly  it  is  struck  clearly  and 
with  vigor,  as  in  his  spirited  account  of 

"  ST.  GERMAIX  DES  PRES." 

Wandering  in  the  most  ancient  and  aristocratic  quarter  of  the 
town,  where  the  neglected  Bourbonites  hide  their  diminished  heads, 
but  with  no  lowering  really  of  their  crest  of  pride,  I  saw  the  insig- 
nificant front  of  a  church  packed  between  like  soiled  and  cheap 
fronts  of  the  decaying  rookeries  of  poverty.  Its  belfry  was  crowned 
with  a  wooden  pyramid,  upon  which  roosts  the  familiar  symbol  of 
Puritan  piety,  the  cock  of  Peter,  of  the  dawn,  or  of  France.  I  found 
out  where  France  got  her  Gallic  name  and  popular  sobriquet,  and 
New  England  her  bird  ecclesiastic.  Having  seen  it  since  as  far 
south  as  Italy,  perched  on  the  spires  of  papal  churches,  it  has  oc- 
curred to  me  that  the  two  symbols  of  the  faith  in  their  days  were  the 
cross  and  the  cock.  With  a  strange  pen'ersion  of  taste,  our  fathers 
rejected  the  former  and  clave  to  the  latter.  Perhaps  they  thought 
it  less  expressive,  and  therefore  less  seductive. 

Seeking  a  momentary  rest,  I  pushed  aside  the  heavy  leathern  veil, 
which  is  the  usual  portal.  "  How  beautiful  !  "  I  instantly  exclaimed. 
"  What  a  glowing  gem  of  art  and  life  is  this  !  "  The  Madelaine,  in 
its  modem  magnificence ;  Notre  Dame,  with  its  interlaced  roof 
and  wide  sweeping  arches;  even  the  Sainte  Chapelle,  with  its 
blaze  of  color,  did  not  diffuse  so  deep  and  tender  a  feeling  as  this 


In  Europe. 


259 


seemingly  obscurest  of  temples.  Only  Saint  Vincent  de  Paule  was 
its  equal,  and  not  its  superior.  Applying  to  my  guide  for  light,  I 
found,  what  one  always  finds,  that  such  gems  of  purest  ray  serene 
are  not  strown  carelessly  in  the  dark  unfathomed  caves  of  the  ocean 
of  humanity.  They  have  a  history  that  warrants  their  array.  I  was 
treading  very  ancient  consecrated  earth.  Thirteen  hundred  years 
ago  Childebert,  son  of  the  first  Christian  king,  who  built  the  other 
St.  Germain,  laid  these  foundations  in  the  pre,  or  meadow  without 
the  town,  as  it  then  was,  but  in  one  of  its  now  oldest  quarters.  His 
name,  and  that  of  Bonaparte,  are  given  to  the  two  streets  on  whose 
corner  the  church  stands.  What  a  space  of  time  those  names  cover  ! 
What  greater  spaces  of  events  !  Dedicated  in  557,  it  was  then  cele- 
brated for  its  beauty,  and  called  "The  Golden  Basilica."  Only  the 
unseen  foundations  and  unseen  spirit  of  that  structure  remain. 
The  Norman  leveled  it.  It  was  rebuilt  in  980,  and  we  can  worship 
within  walls  that  have  heard  the  name  of  Christ  reverently  pro- 
nounced for  nearly  a  thousand  years.  What  if  much  hay  and  stub- 
ble have  been  heaped  upon  the  cross.  There  it  hangs,  and  many  a 
faithful  soul  clings  to  it,  and  not  to  him  who  holds  it  in  his  priestly 
hands.  This  faithful  adhesion  to  Jesus  Christ  and  him  crucified  is 
the  evident  reason  for  the  perpetuity  and  power  of  the  Papal  Church. 
This  is  the  true  blood  which  is  the  life  of  man  ;  and  all  her  diseases, 
severe  as  they  are,  have  not  so  corrupted  her  that  it  is  impossible 
for  the  seeking  soul  to  find  salv^ation  therein.  God's  penetrative 
grace,  by  faith,  can  strike  through  the  whole  superincumbent  mass 
of  Mariolatry,  infallibility,  indulgences,  absolution,  and  such,  and 
renew  the  trusting  penitent  in  His  divine  image  of  power  and  love. 

Unlike  most  churches,  color  is  its  prevailing  characteristic.  The 
stone  pillars,  arches,  nave — every  thing  is  full  of  fire.  The  pillars 
of  the  nave  are  all  painted  in  blue  and  white  ;  those  of  the  choir,  in 
crimson,  black,  and  gold.  The  fretted  roof  high  above  you  is  trans- 
formed into  a  starry  vault,  where,  on  a  sky  of  ultramarine,  golden 
stars  are  ever  shining.  But  the  height  of  its  achievements,  and  that 
which  alone  makes  me  weary  you  with  this  description,  is  the  paint- 
ings that  encompass  the  nave,  over  the  caps  of  the  pillars,  and  above 


26o 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


the  spandrels  of  the  arch.  I  have  seen  hundreds  of  pictures  in  these 
churches,  some  by  great  artists,  but  none  so  original,  so  simple,  so 
beautiful  as  these.  Only  those  in  St.  Boniface,  in  Munich,  approached 
them,  and  they  are  not  equal  in  idea.  M.  Flandin  was  the  designer. 
He  has  lately  died.  In  him  disappeared  not  only  an  artist  but  a 
poet,  an  ideaUst  as  well  as  an  executor — a  talent  rare  in  his  profes- 
sion as  in  every  other.  The  frescoes  are  in  pairs,  a  scene  from  the 
Old  Testament  placed  beside  its  counterpart  from  the  New.  These 
correspondences  are  as  original  as  the  paintings,  and  bespeak  the 
highest  order  of  genius. 

Adam  and  Eve  fleeing  affrighted  at  the  voice  of  the  Lord  is  offset 
by  the  Birth  of  Jesus.  The  very  Lord  they  fly  from  has  become 
their  child.  And  what  admirable  pre-Raphaelism  in  this  picture  of 
the  Nativity !  Mary  lies  on  her  couch  in  a  plain  peasant  dress,  the 
babe  beside  her,  and  Joseph  sitting  at  the  bedside.  Their  faces, 
though  unconscious  of  their  relation  to  God  and  man,  are  yet  fully 
conscious,  so  subtly  has  the  artist  caught  that  true  expression  of  the 
perfect  soul. 

Balaam's  Burnt-Offering  and  the  Adoration  of  the  Magi  are  a 
happy  parallel.  Balaam  has  his  victim  upon  the  altar,  but  is  look- 
ing up  at  a  star  which  he  sees  arise  out  of  Jacob.  The  mountains 
of  Moab  and  the  tents  of  Israel  are  around  and  beneath  him.  But 
his  prophetic  eye  sees  only  that  star.  That  star  these  wise  men 
have  followed.  It  stands  over  the  babe  before  whom— a  victim  also 
— they  are  bowed.  How  fine  the  analogy  and  the  contrast !  What 
Balaam,  the  heathen  prophet,  perforce  declared,  these  heathen 
prophets  gladly  follow.  The  history  of  the  world  and  the  Gospel, 
the  compulsory  recognition  and  the  joyful  obeisance  to  Him  are  thus 
felicitously  taught. 

The  next  series  is  another  Bengelian  connection,  subtile  and  true 
— Moses  before  the  Burning  Bush  and  the  Annunciation.  The  two 
incarnations  are  instantly  suggested.  The  greatness  of  the  latter  is 
seen  not  the  least  in  the  prostration  and  terrrr  of  the  shepherds  as 
compared  with  the  maidenly  calm,  the  reposeful  strength  of  her  who 
could  say,  even  in  that  hour  of  prophetic  suffering  and  sorrow,  and, 


In  Europe. 


261 


worst  of  all,  of  infamy,  "  Behold  the  handmaid  of  the  Lord  !  Be  it 
unto  me  according  to  thy  word."  One  can  hardly  wonder  at  the 
worship  of  the  Virgin  when  he  sees  the  proneness  of  human  nature 
to  worship  any  but  God.  In  our  shrinking  from  Mariolatry  we 
have  ceased  to  have  all  the  reverence  and  affection  that  we  ought 
for  her  who  is  most  highly  honored  of  all  created  beings — archangel, 
angel,  or  man.  Let  us  love  and  revere  "  the  Mother  of  our  Lord," 
as  Elisabeth  did.    That  cannot  be  sin. 

Melchizedek  blessing  and  offering  the  bread  and  wine  to  Abra- 
ham and  his  train  is  set  over  against  the  Lord's  Supper.  Joseph 
sold  into  Egypt  and  Judas  kissing  Christ  is  another  significant 
though  recondite  affinity.  A  long  similitude  might  be  deduced  from 
that  conception.  The  kindred  crime  and  its  kindred  consequences, 
baleful  and  blessed,  open  out  before  us  through  this  narrow  gate- 
way. 

The  Destruction  of  Pharaoh  and  the  Baptism  of  Christ  are  an  un- 
expected conjunction  of  affiliated  opposites.  Water  is  an  instrument 
of  divine  vengeance  and  of  divine  honor.  Man  is  ruined  and  saved 
by  the  same  element.  The  Deluge  would  have  been  a  better  offset 
had  this  alone  been  in  his  mind  ;  but  he  thought,  perhaps,  of  Moses 
calling  down  punishment  by  water  upon  his  enemies,  (for  he  is  the 
central  figure,)  and  Christ  submitting  to  it  for  the  salvation  of  his 
enemies. 

The  Confusion  of  Babd  and  the  Keys  given  to  Peter  teach  the 
re-gathering  of  sundered  and  scattered  man  in  the  Church  and  the 
one  language  of  believers. 

Abraham  offering  up  Isaac  and  the  Crucifixion  are  a  palpable 
analogy,  though  imbued  with  vigor  and  strength  under  this  pencil. 

Jonah  cast  out  by  the  whale  and  the  Resurrection  are  the  last  and 
greatest  of  the  series.  The  correspondence  is  the  more  familiar  be- 
cause Christ  himself  has  declared  it.  Had  it  been  left  like  many  of 
these,  to  human  ingenuity,  we  should  have  wondered  at  its  wonder- 
ful and  fruitful  significance.  Both  of  these  scenes  are  handled  with 
uncommon  reality  and  power.  Jonah,  naked,  is  running  up  the 
beach,  having  just  scrambled  upon  his  feet,  after  being  cast  out  by 


262 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


the  hideous  monster  before  us.  A  huge  wave  is  chasing  him  fierce- 
ly, and  half  submerges  him  in  its  angry  foam,  as  if  it  would  accom- 
plish the  destruction  in  which  the  baffled  whale  had  failed.  His 
face  is  full  of  unspeakable  thankfulness  and  terror.  In  wonderful 
contrast  is  the  serene  majesty  of  Him  who  is  not  cast  fearfully  forth 
by  devouring  death  at  the  command  of  God,  but  rises  from  his  sep- 
ulcher  as  if  it  were,  as  it  was,  but  the  couch  of  momentary  and 
peaceful  slumber.  The  sepulcher  is  not  a  cave,  but  a  sarcophagus, 
a  common  stone  coffin.  The  "  stone  "  is  the  huge  slab  which  covers 
it,  that  is  pushed  away  as  carelessly  as  if  it  were  the  silken  coverlet 
of  a  bed  of  down.  He  is  thus  brought  nearer  to  us  in  fate  and  in 
consolation  than  if  seen  emerging  from  a  cave.  It  is  at  once  more 
frightful  and  more  triumphant  to  come  forth  from  the  familiar  and 
fearful  coffin. 

Intensely  republican  in  all  his  convictions,  Mr.  Ha- 
ven's natural  political  fervor  was  intensely  stimulated  by 
the  criticism  of  which  he  found  his  country  and  its  ad- 
ministration the  subject  in  every  direction  in  Europe. 
He  naturally  exaggerated  the  hostility  of  the  partisans 
of  monarchical  and  aristocratic  institutions,  and  was  a 
little  over  ready  to  draw  his  pen  in  defense  of  America. 
Making  the  acquaintance  of  Dr.  Cuyler  in  Europe,  one 
of  the  first  things  the  pious  men  did  was  to  hold  a 
prayer-meeting  at  their  rooms  for  the  distant  but  unfor- 
gotten  land  of  their  birth.  While  stopping  in  Paris  he 
saw  a  great  deal  of  Dr.  M'Clintock,  then  pastor  of  the 
American  Chapel  in  that  city,  and  a  wise  and  fervid 
champion  of  the  American  cause  before  Europe.  In- 
spired by  his  example,  and  guided  partly  by  his  advice, 
Mr.  Haven  put  the  case  of  America  before  the  English 
public  in  a  long  and  interesting  letter  to  the  London 


In  Europe. 


263 


Watchman,"  the  most  widely  circulated  paper  of  the 
Wesleyans.  It  appears  now  as  though  this  solid  and 
brilliant  condensation  of  America's  position  and  work 
among  the  nations  was  sufficiently  beyond  dispute,  but 
it  did  not  seem  so  then  to  the  editors  of  the  Watch- 
man "  and  their  advisers.  As  the  letter  had  been  asked 
for  by  the  editor,  the  Rev.  Mr.  Rigg,  the  first  half  of  it, 
as  it  now  appears  in  "  National  Sermons,"  was  published 
in  the  London  paper.  Such  was  the  excitement  created 
by  this  article  that  a  committee  of  the  managers  forbade 
the  publication  of  the  rest  of  the  communication.  Mr. 
Rigg  afterward  told  Mr.  Haven  that  the  thing  objected 
to  was  the  statement  of  the  real  cause  of  the  anti- 
American  feeling  of  England.  Here  is  what  the  Wes- 
leyans of  England  did  read,  no  doubt  with  some  sur- 
prise : 

It  is  not  possible,  it  seems  to  me,  for  any  European  people  thor- 
oughly to  apprehend  the  feelings  of  the  American  people  in  this 
great  crisis  of  its  history.  They  are  ruled  over.  We  are  the  rulers. 
They  reverence  a  class ;  we  the  whole.  They  have  no  part,  or  the 
least  possible,  in  the  administration  of  affairs.  We  are  the  sources 
of  administrative  power,  and  our  king  and  his  ministers  are  required 
every  few  years  to  submit  themselves  as  our  representatives  to  our 
judgment.  We  feel,  therefore,  precisely  as  a  king  feels  when  his 
crown  is  assailed.  Himself  and  his  family  are  chiefly  in  his  mind. 
It  was  not  the  interests  of  the  people  that  troubled  Charles  I.,  or 
James  II.,  or  the  King  of  Naples,  or  Napoleon,  or  any  dethroned  or 
attacked  monarch,  but  family  interests.  His  crown  is  his  fortune. 
To  dethrone  him  is  to  rob  him.  Hence  he  fights  for  it.  Hence  he 
is  careful  to  transmit  it,  if  possible,  to  his  children.  So  does  every 
American  feel.  He  is  a  sovereign.  His  sovereignty  is  assailed. 
He  must  defend  it,  even  to  the  death,  or  he  is  a  worm  and  no  man. 


264 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


He  must  transmit  this  great  inheritance  to  his  children  and  his  chil- 
dren's children.  It  is  worth  more  than  any  crown  or  kingly  seat. 
Queen  Victoria  has  no  such  gift  for  Albert  Edward  as  the  poorest 
man  in  America  has  for  all  his  children.  She  can  transmit  authority 
over  millions  of  subjects,  he  authority,  with  millions  of  equals,  over 
his  rulers.  They  are  all  of  royal  blood,  all  equal  heirs  to  royal 
honors. 

If  it  required  some  courage  in  upright  Englishmen  to 
print  such  sentiments,  what  they  did  not  print  would 
have  strained  their  valor  yet  more.  For  Mr.  Haven 
goes  on  to  say  that  America  is  fighting  the  battle  of 
humanity  every-where  against  class  interests  and  selfish- 
ness of  every  sort.  He  tells  them  that  the  seed  sown 
of  Cromwell,  then  betrayed  by  him  and  extirpated  by 
royal  England,  is  coming  to  its  divinely-appointed  high- 
est fruition  in  America  ;  he  predicts  the  development  of 
a  universal  Republic,  before  which  thrones  and  crowns 
are  to  vanish  like  a  puff  of  smoke.  And,  finally,  he  fore- 
shadows what  the  war  means  for  both  countries  in  start- 
ling words : 

We  have  yet  a  great  work  to  do  in  this  matter,  a  work  which  no 
European  can  comprehend,  which  almost  every  American  yet  shrinks 
from,  but  whose  preliminary  steps,  to  our  honor  it  shall  be  said,  we 
are  willing  to  take,  letting  Providence  direct  the  issue.  It  is  this : 
the  African  race  is  among  us,  in  slavery,  or  akin  to  it.  It  is  unlike 
every  other  race,  who  are  welcomed,  whose  lineage  is  speedily  for- 
gotten, and  whose  blood  mingles  freely  each  with  each.  The  dis- 
tinctions and  pride  of  European  races  have  totally  disappeared  there. 
I  know  eminent  families  in  whose  blood  a  half  dozen  of  these  races 
are  represented.  We  therefore  cease  to  taiK  of  English,  Irish,  Ger- 
man, French,  Celtic,  or  Teutonic,  or  any  such  clannish  blood.  We 
call  ourselves  the  Caucasian— the  white  race.    Yet  this  is  clannish. 


In  Europe. 


265 


And  as  these  narrow  feelings  dwell  in  European  nationalities,  so 
this  like  narrow,  if  larger,  sentiment  works  in  us.  Now  the  prob- 
lem is  thrust  upon  us  by  Providence  of  the  relation  of  the  Cau- 
casian to  the  African  race,  the  white  to  the  black.  Our  funda- 
mental and  most  vital  theories  require  that  we  make  no  distinction, 
that  we  be  as  unmindful  of  the  accident  of  color  as  of  that  of  birth 
or  tongue.  But  our  feelings  are  largely  averse  to  the  conclusions  to 
which  we  are  thus  driven.  We  cannot  deny  our  foundation  princi- 
ples, we  cannot  instantly  overcome  the  prejudices  of  generations. 

On  some  accounts  it  was  to  be  regretted  that  Mr. 
Haven  did  not  see  Europe  at  a  calmer  period,  when  he 
could  have  looked  at  the  relations  of  the  Old  and  the 
New  World  under  an  atmosphere  less  disturbed  by  po- 
litical commotions,  and  when  the  social  and  civic  con- 
trasts and  oppositions  were  less  violently  marked  than 
during  our  civil  war.  He  might  have  had  a  broader, 
and  therefore  wiser  vision  of  the  action  and  reaction  of 
these  different  and  sometimes  hostile  systems  upon  each 
other,  and  of  the  probable  results  on  both  sides  of  the 
Atlantic.  But  perhaps  it  was  best  in  view  of  the 
great  principles  he  was  set  to  interpret,  the  evils  he  had 
to  denounce  and  combat,  and  the  example  he  had  to 
set,  that  he  saw  the  scenes  and  society  of  Europe  just 
when  and  as  he  did.  Perhaps  in  no  other  way,  and  at  no 
other  time,  could  certain  great  conceptions  of  the  mis- 
sion and  destiny  of  his  native  land  have  been  so  blended 
with  his  intimate  convictions  as  to  throb  in  every  pulsa- 
tion of  his  veins. 
12 


266 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  XV. 

BOSTON. 

Stationed  in  Boston— The  North  Russell  Street  Church— Social  Meetings— Preaching 
— Spiritual  Life — Literary'  Work — Purchase  of  Grace  Church — Business  Tact — Grace 
Church  Re-opened— A  Call  and  Half  a  Call — Buries  his  Father — Letter  to  VV.  M.  In- 
graham — The  Church's  Work  in  the  South — Letter  to  Bishop  Ames — Letter  from  Bishop 
Ames — The  Conscript  Missionar>''s  Perplexities  —  Further  Correspondence  —  Bishop 
Thomson's  Courtesy— Serious  Illness — Approval  of  his  Conscience — Bad  Health — Idle- 
ness— Improvement. 

IN  April,  1863,  Mr.  Haven  was  appointed  pastor  of 
the  North  Russell  Street  Church,  Boston.  As  this 
parish  was  perfectly  accessible  by  rail  from  ]\Ialden,  he 
continued  to  reside  there  with  his  young  children  at 
the  house  of  his  parents.  This  arrangement  not  only 
provided  in  the  best  possible  way  for  the  children,  but 
it  supplied  him  in  some  measure  with  society  for  the 
weary  leisure  which  clings  about  the  busiest  lives. 

The  new  charge  had  once  been  one  of  the  best  ap- 
pointments in  Boston,  and  had  enjoyed  the  services  of 
many  able  men  in  its  pastorate.  But  changes  in  popu- 
lation had  long  been  going  on  in  the  city  which  steadily 
drew^  away  some  of  the  best  and  most  influential  fam- 
ilies. The  movement  was  one  which  affected  nearly  all 
the  Protestant  churches  at  the  North  End  in  the  same 
way.  Business  was  crowding  out  many  families,  and 
the  population  was  now  growing  largely  foreign  and 
CathoHc.    Pretty  soon  after  his  appointment  he  told  a 


Boston.  267 

friend  that  his  society  must  speedily  move  or  die,  and 
that  many  of  them  were  quite  ready  to  die.  Still  Pastor 
Haven  was  not  exactly  the  man  to  take  kindly  to  mori- 
bund propositions  in  any  case  where  life  was  worth  hav- 
ing. He  turned  the  problem  over  in  his  own  mind,  and 
concluded  that  life,  under  improved  conditions,  was 
both  feasable  and  desirable  for  the  North  Russell  Street 
Church. 

He  went  quietly  and  diligently  about  his  pastoral 
work,  and  speedily  showed  his  usual  success  in  it.  He 
loved  the  means  of  grace  as  well  as  ever,  and  cherished 
the  conviction  that  all  real  advances  in  Church  life  must 
rest  upon  a  wiser  appreciation  and  more  diligent  use  of 
them.  He  was  so  fervent  and  spiritual  in  his  own  em- 
ployment of  these  fountains  of  life  that  he  presently 
drew  all  the  more  religious  and  genuine  spirits  in  his 
society  to  a  more  profitable  attendance  upon  them. 
He  did  not  say  so  much  about  old-fashioned  religion  as 
some,  but  he  fed  upon  it  in  secret,  and  showed  its  vital 
power  in  its  fullness.  It  struck  some  of  his  congrega- 
tion strangely  that  one  who  had  just  visited  some  of 
the  greatest  of  Christian  assemblies  and  listened  to  the 
grand  services  of  minsters  and  cathedrals  should  find 
such  intense  delight  in  the  simplest  and  homeliest  of  his 
own  means  of  grace.  Yet  they  soon  found  that  he  had 
a  far  keener  appreciation  of  that  worship  in  spirit  and 
in  truth  which  really  pleases  God  than  of  high  religious 
art.  The  splendor  of  storied  windows,  the  grandeur  of 
magnificent  churches,  and  the  orderly  beauty  of  cathe- 
dral worship  had  no  religious  charm  for  him,  except  as 


268 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


they  embodied  the  real  worship  of  religious  genius  in 
the  past  or  drew  Hving  worship  out  of  the  wonderin^^ 
and  prostrate  spectators. 

He  used  to  say  that  the  mourners'  bench,  thronged 
with  penitents,  was  nearer  to  heaven  than  St.  Peter's, 
and  that  a  Methodist  camp-meeting  wa^  God's  favorite 
cathedral.  Such  services  must  be  spiritual  or  they  are 
nothing,  and  this  bare  and  perfect  dependence  upon  the 
spirit  of  real  religion  was  for  him  their  greatest  attrac- 
tion. One  who  had  these  views  of  his  religious  work  in 
its  daily  routine  was  pretty  sure  to  mak^  others  feel,  if 
not  think,  as  he  did,  and  Pastor  Haven  had  an  openness 
of  soul  which  made  his  piety  contagious.  One  of  the  re- 
markable features  of  his  letters  and  journals  at  this  date 
is  the  frequency  wherewith  he  records  his  own  enjoy- 
ment of  such  scenes  of  worship.  Thus 'le  says :  "Had 
a  good  time  at  prayer-meeting — very  solemn  and  com- 
forting." "  Have  been  to  Hamilton  and  Yarmouth  the 
last  week  to  camp-meeting.  Had  a  goo<i  time  at  both, 
but  the  best  at  Yarmouth,  as  there  I  spent  the  Sabbath, 
a  blessed,  beautiful  day." 

We  have  occasional  notices  of  his  sei-mons,  old  and 
new : 

Had  a  good  time  this  morning  preaching  from  "  Ye  have  an  unc- 
tion from  the  holy  One."  The  fourth  time  I  have  preached  it ;  it  is 
capable  of  being  made  a  great  thing,  but  mmst  be  vritten  out.  Read 
an  old  sermon  this  afternoon  on  "Without  God  in  the  world."  Did 
not  feel  it,  and  so  it  did  no  good.  Wont  do  so  aga  n.  Yet  how  often 
I  say  that,  and  then  do  it !  Old  sermons  are  dead  sermons  unless 
made  alive  by  the  voice  of  the  Son  of  God.  .  .  .  Las  :  Sunday  preached 
on  "And  Asa  renewed  the  altar  of  the  Lord,"  and  the  barren  fig- 


Boston. 


269 


tree,  two  nevv  sermons,  one  written ;  had  a  better  time.  .  .  .  Preached 
at  Cliftondale  lo-diy  on  "  Ye  are  come  to  Mount  Zion had  a  good 
time.  Preached  this  afternoon  on  "  He  gave  himself  for  us," — Christ 
our  substitute.  Had  a  good  time  pleading  with  sinners.  .  .  .  Dis- 
coursed to-day  on  "  My  beloved  is  mine,  and  I  am  his."  Precious, 
unspeakably  precious  is  the  feeling  of  love  for  Christ.  I  could 
hardly  restrain  myself  at  the  thought  of  his  love  for  me,  so  worth- 
less, so  wicked.  Spoke  of  the  relation  of  the  redeemed  soul  to  him 
as  one  of  conscioi  s  affection,  my  beloved — conscious  possession,  is 
mine — reciprocal,  and  I  am  his — undivided,  of  its  existing  in  spite  of 
our  infirmities  anc  sins  even.  How  great  is  his  love,  how  eternal  ! 
O  that  I  might  reveal  it  more  !  I  am  dreadfully  tempted  much  of 
the  time,  and  miserable  beyond  description.  The  loss,  how  fresh 
and  dreadful.    Go  1  comfort  and  guide  me  ! 

He  was  not  /ery  well  content  with  his  preaching  at 
this  period,  anc  the  fault  was,  of  course,  mainly  his  own. 
He  prepared  his  sermons  in  too  much  haste  to  do  jus- 
tice to  himself  or  them.  He  too  often  has  to  say  some- 
thing like  this:  "  Preached  two  old  sermons  to-day;  do 
not  like  to  preach  old  sermons,  but  was  so  pressed  with 
calls  and  cares  that  I  neglected  preparation  last  week." 

My  sermon  was  very  imperfect.  Did  not  begin  it 
in  season,"  he  confesses  at  another  time. 

The  reason  of  this  dissatisfaction  with  his  preaching 
is  easy  to  see. 

Side  by  side  ^vith  these  confessions  we  have  a  quali- 
fying explanation  of  them  in  remarks  showing  that  his 
preaching  was  effective : 

The  Church  has  published  my  sermon  on  President  Lincoln's 
death.  Preached  a  funeial  sermon  for  Rev.  Daniel  E.  Chapin's 
son,  who  died  of  v  ounds  received  in  the  Virginia  battles.  Subject, 
"Our  Christian  Soldiers,  Christian  Martyrs."    A  large  and  attentive 


2/0  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

audience.  Had  an  anonymous  epistle,  scolding  me  ferociously  for 
my  fast-day  sermon.  Also  one  praising  me  as  extravagantly  from 
Dr.  Whedon  for  my  critique  on  him  in  the  "  Independent."  So 
bane  and  antidote  go  together.  Whedon  wishes  me  to  set  about  a 
history  of  doctrine  for  the  first  three  centuries.  Don't  feel  compe- 
tent for  so  great  a  task.  Yet  I  fritter  myself  away  on  editorials  and 
such. 

Still  these  calls  multiplied  on  his  hands :  "  Had  a  let- 
ter from  Dr.  Curry,  asking  for  editorials  and  other  aid. 
So  does  Dr.  Crooks  ask.    Busy  beyond  my  powers." 

These  demands  grew  so  fast  that  pretty  often  come' 
statements  like  this :  Wrote  an  article  on  Lay  Repre- 
sentation last  week,  one  on  Spring  for  the  *  Independ- 
ent,' rewrote  one  on  Zurich  for  the  '  Repository,'  a  Bos- 
ton letter,  and  book  notices — the  last  eighteen  pages 
long — for  the  'Advocate.'  "  No  wonder  he  adds:  ''Am 
so  driven  by  these  calls  that  I  neglect  my  studies,  my 
travels,  which  I  am  trying  to  write  up,  and,  I  fear,  my 
sermons.  The  first  and  last  I  must  try  to  avoid,  though 
I  make  many  new  sermons,  more  than  ever  before." 
His  w^ork  brought  him  in  several  hundreds  of  dollars  a 
year,  always  a  welcome  addition  to  a  meager  salary. 
Then,  too,  he  spoke  to  a  far  wider  and  more  influential 
audience  in  the  least  of  these  papers  than  waited  on  his 
ministry  at  North  Russell  Street.  Indeed,  the  usual 
congregation  there  was  much  smaller  than  any  he  had 
preached  to  for  years,  and  the  prevalent  expectation  of 
dying  as  a  society  did  not  help  matters.  He  attracted 
some  attention  as  a  preacher  of  sermons  on  special  occa- 
sions, occasions  which  were  sadly  frequent  in  those  fierce 
and  terrible  war  times. 


B(3ST0X. 


271 


Soon  after  the  opening  of  his  second  year  at  North 
Russell  Street  he  says  in  the  Journal :  Preached  to  a 
thin  house.  Prospects  are  poor  indeed  at  our  church  ; 
must  move  or  die."  He  had  been  silently  but  in  dead 
earnest  giving  good  heed  to  this  question  of  a  removal 
of  his  Church,  where  not  only  life  might  be  possible,  but 
a  strong  and  vigorous  and  fruitful  existence  would  be 
assured.  He  found  an  empty  church  in  the  quarter  of 
the  city  he  wished  to  occupy — Grace  Church,  on  Tem- 
ple Street,  near  the  State  House.  It  had  been  built  by 
some  Episcopalians,  seceders  from  a  neighboring  parish, 
who  found  no  adequate  support  for  their  enterprise 
there.  After  many  and  serious  sacrifices  to  sustain  the 
movement,  failure  could  not  be  avoided,  and  so  the 
minister  was  dismissed,  the  church  closed,  and  the  con- 
gregation scattered.  The  business  sagacity  of  Pastor 
Haven  showed  him  how  this  combination  of  circum- 
stances might  be  turned  in  favor  of  his  scheme.  Here 
was  a  church  whose  owners  would  sell  it  far  below  its 
real  value,  for  some  of  them  were  so  tired  of  their  enter- 
prise that  they  wished  to  render  its  renewal  impossible, 
and  hence  gave  up  their  pews  and  provoked  others  to 
do  Hkewise  in  aid  of  the  plan.  Members  of  the  Church 
from  which  the  seceders  had  withdrawn  were  also  desir- 
ous of  having  the  church  pass  into  other  hands,  and  gave 
considerable  sums  to  aid  in  its  purchase. 

Still,  with  all  these  abatements  made,  the  purchase- 
money  would  be  a  far  greater  sum  than  the  dispirited  and 
diminished  society  at  North  Russell  Street  could  raise. 
How  should  the  rest  be  obtained  ?    Pastor  Haven  knew 


2/2  Ltfe  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

that  several  wealthy  Boston  Methodists  had  long  cher- 
ished the  desire  to  see  a  free  Methodist  Church  estab- 
lished and  maintained  in  that  city.  Why  not  make  this 
experiment  at  Grace  Church  in  Temple  Street  ?  This 
was  the  link  which  drew  into  his  scheme  the  outside 
men  whose  support  secured  its  speedy  achievement. 
On  August  21,  1864,  he  records:  "Have  purchased 
Grace  Church  ;  shall  take  possession  next  Tuesday ; 
have  $10,000  to  raise  for  repairs."  Seven  months  later 
we  find  this  statement  :  "  The  church  paid  lor,  and  re- 
pairs in  progress.  It  will  look  well  when  done.  It  will 
cost  S^O,ooo.  Have  only  $2,000  pledged.  Our  chapel 
will  help  to  pay  the  rest."  A  colored  congregation 
wished  to  obtain  his  old  church,  and  he  helped  ear- 
nestly both  by  selling  at  a  low  price  and  by  getting 
subscriptions  for  the  expense. 

Some  months  later  (November  6)  he  records  these 
facts  : 

My  last  Sunday  is  spent  in  my  present  station.  Grace  Church 
was  opened  October  18.  Rev.  C.  D.  Foss,  D.D.,  preached  the  ser- 
mon ;  it  was  a  fine  sermon  finely  delivered.  We  raised  $5,000, 
which  leaves  it  free  of  debt.  The  evening  exercises  were  very  inter- 
esting. Rev.  J.  W.  F.  Barnes,  Methodist ;  Rev.  Mr.  Burrill,  Epis- 
copalian ;  John  A.  Andrew,  Governor  of  the  Commonwealth  ;  Rev. 
W.  S.  Studley,  Methodist ;  Judge  Russell,  Collector  of  the  Port  of 
Boston  ;  and  Rev.  Dr.  Kirk,  Congregaiionalist,  were  the  speakers. 
Jane.  Kate,  and  Aunt  Sency  were  present,  and  made  us  a  fine  visit 
of  ten  days  afierv.'ard. 

Grace  Church  is  one  of  the  monuments  of  Mr.  Ha- 
ven's tact,  sagacity,  and  skill  in  combining  the  forces 


Boston.  273 

within  his  reach  so  as  to  carry  the  special  object  upon 
which  he  had  set  his  heart.  He  greatly  enjoyed  doing 
the  work,  notwithstanding  the  multiplicity  of  his  occu- 
pations. His  plans  were  so  well  matured  and  adequate 
that  they  rarel>-  crowded  each  other  so  as  distract  him. 
And  he  enjoyed  the  success  which  this  Church  has 
achieved  since  under  the  faithful  labors  of  the  Eminent 
ministers'who  have  followed  him  in  that  pastorate,  some 
of  them  among  his  most  intimate  personal  friends.  Nor 
was  he  without  foretastes  of  the  coming  prosperity,  for 
almost  all  his  communion  seasons  were  marked  by  addi- 
tions to  the  Church.  Thus  the  first  Sunday  in  May, 
1865,  he  not»s  down:  "Baptized  three  by  immersion, 
admitted  six  into  the  Church."  About  the  same  time 
he  says  :  "  Had  a  deep  and  powerful  meeting  this  even- 
ing; two  were  forward  for  prayers."  And  of  the  last 
Sabbath  he  w--ites  gratefully:  To-day  baptized  six, 
and  received  eight  into  full  connection.  We  had  eight 
forward  for  prayers,  a  great  crowd  present.  Things 
look  very  prosperous  for  them." 

Mr.  Haven's  growing  success  before  the  public  and 
his  unusual  business  gifts  led  to  some  applications  to 
undertake  positions  largely  requiring  such  gifts.  He 
was  consulted  by  Messrs.  Rice,  Rich,  and  Raymond  as 
to  taking  the  position  of  Principal  at  Wilbraham.  This 
he  positively  dc^clined,  and  adhered  to  his  resolution. 

In  June,  1864,  there  was  a  similar  suggestion  from 
Lima,  N.  Y. : 

Was  written  to  last  week,  urging  that  my  name  might  be  brought 

before  the  trustees  for  the  presidency  of  Genesee  College.     I  re- 
12* 


274  I-iFE  OF  Gilbert  Haven. 

fused  and  then  consented,  whereupon  it  was  not  even  brought  for- 
ward. It  makes  me  indignant.  Some  friends  wanted  me,  but  they 
had  no  power  to  effect  any  thing.  I  did  not  wish  to  go,  but  I  do  not 
wish  to  be  annoyed. 

Writing  to  Rev.  G.  M.  Steele,  D.D.,  he  unbosoms 
himself  more  freely: 

My  Companion  in  tribulation  :  I  just  put  my  foot  into  the  edge 
of  the  Genesee  trap  and  got  bit.  Don't  blow  me  up  for  this  fastidious- 
ness about  their  applying  for  a  fellow's  name,  and  getting  it  only  to 
hit  him  back.  I  declined  positively  to  let  the  name  go  before  the  Lima 
trustees  ;    wrote  back  entreating  me  to  withdraw  the  declara- 

tion. I  half  did  it,  saying,  "  Can't  promise,  will  consider  it  if  elected  ;" 
whereupon  it  was  trumpeted  all  over  Boston  that  I  had  accepted  ; 
and  lo,  Loomis  is  elected,  Alverson  being  too  many  guns  for  the 
other  professors.  Next  time  you  catch  me  that  way  you'll  know  it. 
You  may  call  it  fastidiousness,  I  call  it  manliness.  Still  I  liked  your 
tonic.  I  had  had  bewildering  flatteries  that  day  from  Rice  and  Ray- 
mond as  to  my  Wilbraham  fitness,  and  the  truthfulness  of  your  note 
was  healthful.  That'  I  declined,  and  think  I  should  have  treated 
Genesee  in  like  style  had  it  come  in  like  absolute  shape. 

Before  telling  the  story  of  his  removal  from  Grace 
Church  let  us  note  two  deaths  among  the  many  which 
touched  him  deeply  in  these  crowded  months.  The  loss 
of  his  own  father  is  narrated  in  a  letter  to  Mr.  W.  M. 
Ingraham,  dated  February  24,  1863  : 

I  sit  down  at  this  almost  midnight  hour  in  the  room  from  which 
my  dear  and  honored  father  ascended  to  his  Father  and  our  Father, 
to  his  God  and  our  God,  to  answer  your  very  welcome  note.  It  is 
true,  as  you  say,  that  you  know  the  full  weight  of  this  sorrow  and  the 
fuller  weight  of  the  consolations  that  accompany  it ;  for  your  fathers, 
like  mine,  walked  with  God^  and  were  not  because  God  took  them. 


Boston. 


275 


His  death  was  very  sudden,  as  you  may  have  seen  in  the  "  Her- 
ald." I  have  had  ample  opportunities  of  seeing  him  and  being  v^ith 
him  since  my  return  from  Europe.  He  had  been  better  than  usual 
all  winter,  being  active  in  home,  Church,  and  other  matters.  A 
week  ago  yesterday  he  fell  in  the  back  yard,  and  struck  with  full 
force  on  his  chest.  The  pains,  which  had  lelt  his  chest,  returned 
and  increased,  though  not  to  create  alarm  till  the  day  he  died.  And 
then  they  did  not  appear  so  fatal  as  they  proved.  He  was  down 
street  that  morning,  ate  his  dinner,  though  complaining  much  of 
pain,  was  about  the  house  and  out  in  the  yard  in  the  afternoon,  read- 
ing and  talking.  As  the  pain  increased  he  came  into  the  dining- 
room,  drank  a  glass  of  hot  whisky  the  girls  fixed  for  him,  lay  down 
on  the  sofa,  and  in  less  than  three  minutes  he  was  gone. 

Another  death  which  moved  him  greatly  was  that  of 
Rev.  Charles  Baker,  who  had  known  and  loved  Gilbert 
and  Mary  Haven  from  the  dear  Northampton  days: 

Father  Baker  died  Tuesday  morning,  and  was  buried  Friday.  He 
went  in  a  flash,  without  pain,  and  in  great  ecstasy.  How  he  must 
have  greeted  Mary  with  his  pleasant,  familiar  smile,  and  told  her 
about  me!  I  cried  much  at  his  funeral — more  than  his  wife,  who 
was  greatly  sustained.  When  shall  I  see  the  day  that  ends  my 
woes  } 

How  he  could  comfort  the  bereft  may  be  seen  from 
part  of  his  letter  to  his  old  friend,  W.  M.  Ingraham,  re- 
specting the  departure  of  his  father-in-law,  Rev.  Robert 
Seney,  dated  February  13,  1863: 

I  thought  of  you  when  I  read  the  unexpected  obituary,  and  have 
followed  you  all  the  afternoon  and  evening,  and  now  see  you  in  the 
dark  and  desolate  house.  You  have  met  with  the  greatest  loss  you 
have  ever  suffered.  You  are  wading  through  the  deepest  waters 
into  which  the  providence  of  God  has  ever  led  you.    Not  ignorant 


276 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


of  sorrow,  I  know  how  to  sympathize  with  you,  or,  rather,  I  know 
how  impossible  it  is  to  sympathize  with  the  smitten  heart.  God 
only  can.  He  does.  "  I  will  be  with  him  in  trouble."  That  is 
enough — a  sure  refuge,  a  strong  consolation  we  have  in  him.  I 
hardly  thought  when  I  was  reading,  the  last  Sabbath  I  was  in  En- 
gland, in  the  gardens  of  St.  John's  College,  your  letter  which  you 
wrote  me  almost  three  years  ago,  that  my  first  letter  after  I  got 
home  would  be  one  to  you  of  like  character.  I  am  glad  that  a  like 
calamity  did  not  call  for  it.  Though  this  trial  might  be  greater,  I 
know  it  is  unspeakably  great. 

None  would  be  more  missed  by  me  when  I  shall  look  in  again 
upon  that  cheerful  and  welcome  home.  His  heart  was  always 
young.  His  voice  and  manner  never  savored  of  age  or  decrepitude. 
Few  men  of  his  years,  no  one  of  my  acquaintance,  was  so  full  of 
youthful  spirits.  How  you  must  miss  him  !  But  'twill  only  make 
heaven  the  richer.  How  fast  the  goodly  company  is  increasing  wiih 
additions  from  my  circle  of  acquaintance  and  affection  !  It  seems  far 
more  like  home  to  me  than  any  spot  on  earth. 

How  does  your  mother  bear  the  dreadful  load  }  IVIay  God  sus- 
tain her ! 

As  the  civil  war  drew  to  its  close  Mr.  Haven  was  on 
the  watch  to  see  that  the  work  of  reorganizing  the 
Pvlethodism  of  the  South  should  be  so  managed  as  to 
avoid  the  grievous  errors  of  the  past.  He  regarded  the 
existence  of  separate  Churches  for  men  holding  the 
same  religious  views,  solely  because  they  were  of  differ- 
ent complexion,  as  both  impolitic  and  sinful.  Hence  he 
had  not  only  warned  the  Church  publicly  against  this 
foolish  and  expensive  course,  but  he  took  measures  to 
arouse  public  feeling  against  it.  In  1864  he  had  pro- 
cured the  admission  of  a  colored  minister,  Rev.  J.  N. 
Mars,  to  the  New  England  Conference,  and  urged  the 


Boston. 


2/7 


authorities  to  put  him  in  charge  of  some  of  the  churches 
of  that  region. 

In  April,  1865,  he  procured  the  passage  of  a  series  of 
resolutions  on  the  Southern  work,  pitched  in  the  same 
key,  and  aflame  with  earnestness,  since  the  hour  of  de- 
cision was  at  hand.  He  inclosed  a  copy  of  these  reso- 
lutions to  leading  officials  of  the  Church,  among  others 
to  Dr.  Durbin  and  Bishop  Ames.  To  both  he  sent  ear- 
nest letters  insisting  on  the  policy  he  advocated,  and 
summoning  them  to  the  leadership  of  this  new  depart- 
ure.   The  letter  to  Bishop  Ames  ran  thus : 

Rev.  Bishop  Ames: 

Dear  Brother— Will  you  allow  me  to  call  your  attention  to  the 
resolutions  of  our  Conference  on  the  subject  of  Reconstruction  in  the 
South  ?  They  were  approved  by  nearly  every  leading  mind— Drs. 
Cummings,  Cobleigh,  Bar'-ows,  Brothers  Twombly,  Cox,  Clark,  Rice, 
etc.,  and  by  almost  all  the  body.  They  have  since  passed  the  Maine 
Conference,  and  substantially  the  New  Hampshire.  They  are  in 
direct  agreement  with  the  policy  of  negro  suffrage,  or  universal  cit- 
izenship, which  I  am  happy  to  hear  that  you  indorse.  Could  our 
Church  have  a  new  session  of  the  General  Conference,  I  am  sure 
that,  in  the  remarkable  progress  of  events  and  opinions  the  last  year, 
she  would  not  organize  colored  Conferences,  or  in  any  way  separate 
these  brethren  from  the  rest.  Four  years  in  thes'e  times  are  four 
ages  ;  and  it  is  essential  that  our  organization  in  the  South  should 
begin  at  once,  and  begin  aright.  We  ought  to  do  as  a  Church  what 
we  must  do  as  a  nation— ignore  the  prejudice  against  color  and  the 
distinctions  of  color.  Can  we  not  begin  this  work  by  appointing 
such  brethren  missionaries  in  the  South,  holding  connection  with  our 
Conferences.  This  is  what  we  sought  to  do  last  year  in  the  case  of 
Brother  Mars,  which  you  did  not  object  to.  Our  Conference  at  this 
session  requested  his  return  and  employment  in  this  v/ork.  He 


2/8 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


would  be  of  immense  benefit  to  us  at  Richmond,  where  he  ardently 
desires  to  go. 

I  hope  you  will  pardon  this  note.  It  is  written  solely  in  the  inter- 
ests of  the  Church,  Christ,  and  humanity.  I  feel  that  no  one  in  our 
Church  has  more  influence,  and  deservedly  so,  than  yourself.  I  am 
happy  to  serve  under  so  wise  a  leader.  I  know  that  if  you  take  this 
step,  and,  so  far  as  your  influence  extends,  break  up  this  unchristian 
line  of  separation  in  the  yet-unoccupied  territory  where  we  can  reor- 
ganize aright,  without  encroaching  on  conceded  rights,  the  whole 
Church  will  gladly  follow  you. 

Trusting  you  will  pardon  this  intrusion  in  view  of  the  greatness 
of  the  cause  that  impels  it,  I  remain 

Most  respectfully  yours  Gilbert  Haven. 

Malden,  May  lo,  1865. 

These  decided  notions  concerning  the  form  and  spirit 
of  the  work  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  in  the 
South,  Mr.  Haven  urged  with  great  fervor  and  earnest- 
ness in  the  public  journals,  particularly  in  the  ''Christian 
Advocate "  and  the  "  Independent."  As  in  some  in- 
stances there  had  appeared  indications  of  a  disposition 
to  disregard  these  principles,  his  criticism  had  been  both 
affectionate  and  unsparing.  It  appears  that  the  authori- 
ties of  the  Church  did  not  think  themselves  authorized 
by  the  Discipline  to  insist  on  the  impartial  course  so  elo- 
quently urged'  upon  them  ;  and,  perhaps,  some  of  them 
doubted  the  possibility  of  success  in  the  South  under 
such  guidirg  principles.  Of  course,  sagacious  men  like 
the  Bishops  of  the  Church  of  that  day  must  have  fore- 
seen the  development  of  these  differences,  and  have 
made  up  their  minds  what  course  to  take  in  their  ad- 
ministration in  the  South.  Whether  wisely  or  not,  they 
judged  themselves  bound  by  the  Discipline  to  recognize 


Boston. 


2/9 


work  in  the  South  which  did  recognize  distinctions  of 
color  as  well  as  work  that  did  not.  Hence  some  annoy- 
ance was  felt  at  the  telling  criticism  of  Mr.  Haven,  and 
a  conviction  was  cherished  on  the  part  of  Bishop  Ames 
that  it  was  the  work  of  an  unexperienced  and,  therefore, 
unpractical  theorist.  The  Bishop  accordingly  answered 
Mr.  Haven's  appeal  only  as  follows  : 

Indianapolis,  Ind.,  June  21,  1865. 

Rev.  Gilbert  Haven: 

Dear  Brother — You  are  hereby  apj3ointecl  to  labor  as  mission- 
ary in  Vicksburg,  Miss.  .  .  .  There  are  many  colored  people  in  the 
city  and  vicinity  to  whom  your  presence  and  influence  will,  I  trust, 
be  of  service  in  many  ways.  A  convention  will  soon  be  called. 
Jackson,  the  seat  of  the  government,  is  easy  of  access.  I  have  good 
hope  that  the  influence  you  will  be  able  to  exert  among  the  public 
men  of  the  State  will  aid  in  securing  some  constitutional  protection 
for  the  colored  people.  You  will  be  our  only  minister  in  the  State, 
and  much  responsibility  will  rest  upon  you,  but  not  more  than  by 
the  grace  of  God  you  will  be  able  to  bear. 

I  know  of  no  field  of  labor  more  important  in  all  respects  than  the 
one  you  are  about  to  enter.  I  trust  the  divine  blessing  will  attend 
you.  It  is  understood  among  the  Bishops  that  each  shall  take  the 
best  men  he  can  find  for  the  Southern  work.  ...  I  have  written  to 
Bishop  Baker  to  take  charge  of  the  interests  of  the  Church  you 
leave,  I  am  sure  you  have  been  able  to  infuse  enough  of  your  own 
earnest  spirit  into  your  people  to  make  them  willing  to  submit  to  the 
sacrifice  of  parting  with  you  for  such  a  purpose. 

Inclosed  is  a  draft  for  $500.  Write  often  ;  I  will  do  all  I  can  in 
every  way  to  aid  you. 

Yours  truly,  E.  R.  Ames. 

Here  was  a  surprising  answer  to  Mr.  Haven's  letter 
concerning  the  Southern  work,  though  the  brief,  military 
letter  of  the  sturdy  Bishop  said  nothing  about  that  com- 


28o 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


munication.  Yet  there  was  no  doubt  in  Mr.  Haven's 
mind  that  this  entirely  unexpected  appointment  would 
not  have  been  made  but  for  his  course  of  suggestion  and 
criticism.  It  became  known  to  him  that  the  Bishops 
had  consulted  the  other  men  they  had  sent  to  the 
Southern  work,  and  had  even  consulted  two  men  about 
going  to  Vicksburg.  It  became  known  that  some  of 
the  Bishops  objected  to  his  taking  the  matter  into  the 
papers,  and  especially  into  the  "  Independent,"  a  non- 
Methodist  journal.  Hence  the  Bishop's  letter  might 
mean,  Let  us  see  how  an  amiable  theorist  will  get  on  in 
the  hard,  practical  work  of  the  Southern  missionary. 
Let  us  see  whether  he  will  attempt  himself  to  do  what 
he  would  impose  on  others.  No  doubt  Bishop  Ames 
foresaw  that  this  extemporized  missionary  would  be  a 
very  effective  laborer  in  that  vineyard  if  he  could  only 
be  cleared  of  visionary  notions  by  contact  with  the  real 
Southern  world.  Possibly  he  looked  for  a  refusal  to  ac- 
cept work  forced  upon  him  with  such  rude  vigor.  All 
these  surmises  afforded  the  missionary  food  for  sober 
reflection.  What  made  his  course  more  difficult  to  de- 
termine was  the  fact  that  he  had  been  pondering  deeply 
whether  he  ought  not  to  give  himself  to  that  noble  work. 

The  appointment  had  not  come  about  as  he  could 
have  wished,  but  it  had  come  ;  was  it  not  God's  voice 
summoning  him  from  study,  books,  and  letters  to  higher 
labors?  This  was  the  point  for  him  to  weigh  most  anx- 
iously. Then,  could  he  not  use  his  appointment  to  pro- 
cure an  indorsement  of  the  principles  so  dear  to  him; 
and  if  so,  was  it  not  his  plain  duty  to  accept? 


Boston. 


2S1 


Meanwhile  the  Church  whose  pastor  he  was  protested 
against  his  removal  until  the  work  of  paying  for  the  new 
edifice  had  been  completed,  or  some  suitable  pastor  had 
been  actually  appointed  to  take  up  the  work.  After 
much  reflection,  and  serious  counseling  with  his  friends, 
Mr.  Haven  replied  that,  though  surprised  by  the  ap- 
pointment, he  was  not  unwilling  to  accept ;  that  objec- 
tion was  made  by  the  Church  to  his  immediate  removal 
before  certain  expenses  for  the  new  church  had  been 
provided  for  ;  that  he  should  only  go  to  represent  the 
Gospel  of  Christ  as  expounded  by  St.  Paul,  by  making 
no  distinction  of  classes  or  colors  in  his  work  of  reorgan- 
izing the  Church  ;  that  he  lacked  certain  shining  gifts 
specially  valued  in  the  South,  but  did  not  regard  success 
as  out  of  reach  ;  that  he,  an  Abolitionist  of  the  deepest 
dye,  could  not  influence  the  coming  convention  at  Jack- 
son ;  that  the  Bishop  would  soon  hear  from  Mr.  Haven's 
Church  on  the  subject  ;  that,  as  the  Bishop  had  not 
fixed  a  time  for  his  departure,  he  had  ventured  to  wait 
until  all  the  facts  of  the  case  v/ere  laid  before  him  ;  and 
at  last  said,  "  If  you  order  my  departure  at  any  rate  and 
instantly  I  shall  obey." 

The  essential  part  of  Bishop  Ames'  response  follows : 

^    TT  Iowa  Cirv,  Ia.,  July  13,  1863. 

Rev.  G.  Haven:  <  ^  ^  ^.  o 

Dear  Brother— I  have  delayed  answering  your  letter  until  to- 
day, when  I  had  received  the  communication  alluded  to  from  your 
Church.  I  am  glad  your  people  do  not  offer  any  serious  objection 
to  your  going,  and  as  you  consent,  we  will  consider  the  matter  set- 
tled.   Can  you  start  for  Vicksburg  by  August  1 1 

1  have  no  directions  to  give  you  touching  your  duties.    "  We  be 


282 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


brethren,"  ministers  in  the  same  Church,  having  the  same  Discipline 
to  guide  us.  I  have  neither  the  authority  nor  inclination  to  make 
laws.  .  .  . 

Great  changes  are  to  be  made  in  the  civil  constitution  of  the  State 
and  society.  I  think  it  important  for  the  cause  of  God  and  human- 
ity that  some  minister  should  be  on  the  spot  who  is  capable  of  ex- 
erting some  influence  for  the  right,  and  giving  such  a  narrative  of 
facts  as  will  do  good,  if  printed  and  circulated.  Knowing  your 
ability  I  have  selected  you,  and  have  good  hope  that  your  course 
will  demonstrate  to  all  the  wisdom  of  my  choice. 

Yours  truly,  E.  R.  Ames. 

To  this  letter  Mr.  Haven  replied  at  some  length.  He 
says  that  his  consent "  was  mere  obedience  to  orders, 
not  choice,  since  he  could  only  decline  to  go  at  the  risk 
of  having  his  character  arrested  at  the  next  session  of 
the  New  England  Conference  for  not  going  to  his  work. 
He  shows  that  the  Bishop  was  probably  mistaken  in 
thinking  it  possible  for  a  man  of  ultra  views  to  influence 
the  constitutional  convention,  and  that  real  work  in  the 
South  must  be  done  in  the  Church,  by  settling  that  on 
the  basis  of  equal  rights  and  no  caste  distinctions.  He 
quotes  what  the  Bishop  had  said  about  their  having  the 
same  Discipline  to  guide  them,  but  remarks  that  he 
should  feel  bound  to  wage  war  upon  any  thing  like  dis- 
tinctions and  separations  on  the  ground  of  color.  How 
would  the  Bishop  bear  himself  toward  such  measures  ? 

To  this  the  Bishop  responds  almost  impatiently: 

I  have  never  yet  failed  to  sustain  a  brother  minister,  placed  by  my 
official  action  in  a  responsible  and  trying  position.  The  Discipline 
must  bind  us  both.  I  do  not  understand  that  a  pastor  in  our  Church 
violates  the  law  when  he  refuses  to  regard  color  among  his  mem- 


Boston. 


2S3 


bers ;  and  certainly  an  Annual  Conference  can  admit  colored  minis- 
ters, and,  when  admitted,  they  have  all  the  rights  of  ministers 
without  regard  to  color.  I  am  bound  to  give  my  official  sanction 
to  an  administration  based  on  these  facts,  and  shall  give  it  most 
heartily. 

The  Bishop  added  that  he  should  favor  the  admission 
of  colored  ministers  into  the  Annual  Conferences  to  be 
formed  in  the  South. 

This  correspondence  was  only  half  satisfactory  to  the 
perplexed  missionary.  He  was  pleased  to  find  a  man 
of  Bishop  Ames'  caliber  ready  to  approve  the  course  he 
proposed  to  follow  as  being  in  agreement  with  the  law 
of  the  Church.  But  he  could  not  disguise  the  fact  that 
the  Bishops  might  also  think  themselves  bound  to  ap- 
prove, as  also  not  opposed  to  the  letter  of  the  Disci- 
pline, the  administration  of  missionaries  who  should 
regard  color  in  their  members.  Yet  he  deemed  it  his 
duty  to  go  to  Vicksburg  as  soon  as  his  ties  to  the 
Boston  Church  would  allow,  though  he  constantly  said, 
"  If  you  order  me  to  go  at  once  I  shall  go  ;  but  if  you 
leave  me  free  to  stay  till  the  church  is  opened  I  shall 
remain." 

As  Bishop  Ames  would  not  make  the  required  order, 
Mr.  Haven  remained  at  work  in  Boston  until  early  in 
November.  He  left  home  to  meet  Bishop  Ames  in 
New  York,  at  the  meeting  of  the  Missionary  Board, 
about  the  middle  of  that  month,  on  his  way  to  the 
South.  But  here  new  difficulties  arose,  such  as  forced 
him,  for  conscience'  sake,  to  refuse  to  go  to  Vicksburg. 
The  Missionary  Board  closed  the  discussion  by  taking 


284 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


the  ground  that  appropriations  could  only  be  made  to 
the  Southern  work  as  colored  work.  When  this  action 
was  stated  to  Mr.  Haven  by  Bishop  Ames,  and  con- 
firmed by  Bishop  Thomson,  he  firmly  though  kindly 
declined  to  act  under  their  authority  in  that  field.  He 
wrote  to  the  former : 

I  offered  Bishop  Clark  to  go  and  start  that  college  of  Mr.  Claflin's,  / 
in  Tennessee,  and  work  it  at  least  a  year  if  he  would  approve  it ; 
but  he  declined.  He  wished  money  to  found  a  college  for  blacks, 
but  not  for  students  without  distinction  of -color.  As  the  Bishops 
seem  to  feel  that,  in  some  sort,  this  distinction  must  be  kept  up,  I 
must  conscientiously  decline  to  aid  its  perpetuation. 

It  appeared,  moreover,  to  the  authorities  of  the 
Church  that  missionaries  to  the  South  should  be  re- 
quired to  pledge  themselves  to  remain  in  that  work 
longer  than  the  Discipline  required  men  to  remain  in 
one  charge.  The  condition  of  Haven's  health  and  the 
situation  of  his  motherless  children  made  it  undesirable 
for  him  to  assume  any  such  obligation.  As  the  Bishops 
had  agreed  among  themselves  to  require  this  pledge  of 
all  Southern  missionaries,  they  no  longer  expected  him 
to  labor  there. 

The  work  in  Mississippi  now  fell  into  the  hands  of 
Bishop  Thomson.  That  courteous  gentleman  sent  Mr. 
Haven  a  very  cordial  invitation  to  become  presiding 
elder  of  Mississippi,  and  work  the  field  in  the  interests 
of  the  colored  man.  But  as  the  basis  of  the  administra- 
tion remained  unchanged,  Mr.  Haven  declined  the  honor 
with  cordial  good-will  to  the  Bishop  in  charge. 


Boston. 


285 


The  multitude  of  these  cares  and  perplexities,  in  ad- 
dition to  those  secret  griefs  which  were  always  making 
such  large  drafts  upon  his  vital  energy,  was  too  great  for 
him.  His  health  began  to  give  way.  The  Journal  tells 
the  story  in  an  account  of  his  return  from  New  York, 
whither  he  had  gone  to  meet  Bishop  Ames : 

I  came  home  stopping  at  Middletown  and  Springfield,  and  having 
pleasant  visits  with  Van  Vleck,  Newhall,  Cummings,  and  Rice.  I 
went  to  Northampton  and  spent  a  night  in  that  dear  room  where  I 
spent  hundreds  of  happiest  hours.  Dreadful,  dreadful  it  was !  Yet 
not  altogether  comfortless,  for  I  thought  of  the  happiness  to  come. 
How  far  off  it  seems.  How  unspeakable  it  will  be.  Yet  the  agony 
now  seems — Ah  God !  I  reached  home  Friday,  December  30,  and 
Sunday  night  was  attacked  very  severely  by  fever,  typhoid  and  brain. 
-Was  very  dangerously  sick  for  a  week,  and  am  not  well  yet.  But  I 
am  much  better.  The  chief  trouble  and  danger  was  my  head — a 
suffocation,  probably  with  a  tendency  to  apoplexy. 

The  warning  was  clear.  I  felt  I  had  seen  the  path  which  might 
lead  me  to  the  grave,  and  had  entered  upon  it.  It  may  not  be  the 
one  that  God  designs  me  to  pursue  to  the  end.  For  that  I  try  not 
to  care  : 

"  A  thousand  ways  has  Providence 
To  bring  believers  home." 

I  felt  solemn,  at  times  fearful  and  doubting,  the  change  was  so  great 
—the  judgment— my  sins.  But  my  Saviour  rose  above  them  all,  and 
I  rested  sweetly  in  him.  Thanks  and  praises  to  his  name !  I  feel 
that  I  know  whom  I  have  believed,  and  that  he  is  able  to  keep  that 
which  I  have  committed  unto  him  against  that  day.  Very,  very,  very 
unworthy  ;  yet  He  is  worthy. 

This  illness  was  so  severe  that  Mr.  Haven's  friends 
were  seriously  alarmed.  A  visitor  who  called  on  him 
as  soon  as  the  physician  would  allow,  found  him  look- 


286 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


ing  hot,  flushed,  and  weakly,  yet  both  jolly  and  pious  in 
his  pain.  He  was  reading  the  "  Atlantic  Monthly,"  and 
parried  a  suggestion  that  he  ought  not  to  read  a  line 
with  the  remark,  "  The  doctor  told  me  to  read  nothing 
that  would  require  any  attention,  any  strain.  The  'At- 
lantic '  answers  to  that  description."  Of  his  sickness  he 
said,  I  went  down  to  the  river,  looked  over,  and  saw 
the  angels  ;  I  wished  to  join  them,  but  they  didn't  seem 
to  think  about  me." 

He  reviews  the  steps  he  had  just  taken  on  public 
questions  in  these  new  circumstances  very  calmly: 

My  position  on  the  great  question  of  caste  in  the  Church  has 
brought  me  into  public  opposition  to  Bishop  Simpson.  I  criticised 
the  action  of  the  Missionary  Board  in  the  "  Independent."  He 
wrote  them  a  letter  and  Mr.  Tilton  answered  it.  Of  course,  the 
Church  will  charge  it  all  to  me.  I  prepared  an  answer,  which  he 
worked  over  and  made  his  own.  I  am  right,  as  every  Bishop  and 
every  Christian  knows.  The  Church  has  yielded.  She  must  come 
to  the  only  true  path.  My  Conference  has  taken  the  right  position. 
I  think  it  will  stand  by  me.  If  not,  I  know  the  Master  will,  and  that 
he  will  not  faint  nor  be  discouraged  till  he  has  made  us  ignore  one's 
skin  as  we  have  already  his  condition.  I  have  been  brought  into 
prominence  in  this  great  debate.  With  the  Saviour's  help,  I  hope  to 
be  faithful  to  him.  For  I  know  he  is  Judge.  May  he  say  unto  me 
in  that  day,  "  Inasmuch  as  ye  have  done  it  unto  one  of  the  least  of 
these  my  brethren,  ye  have  done  it  unto  me." 

He  tells  the  sad  story  of  his  poor  health  in  his  own 
forlorn  way,  under  date  of  March  25,  1866: 

My  head  troubles  me  much,  but  my  whole  system  has  given  way. 
Work  without  reaction  has  brought  me  to  this  state.  I  know  not 
that  I  shall  ever  be  better.    And  yet,  it  seems  to  me,  if  Mary  were 


Boston. 


287 


here  and  I  could  lay  my  head  in  her  lap  and  sleep  one  good  long 
sleep,  I  should  awake  perfectly  well.  My  feelings  are  the  cause  of 
my  sickness,  they  only. 

I  got  a  little  better,  and  started  to  go  to  Charleston  ;  some  friends 
made  me  up  a  purse  of  $600.  I  got  to  Brooklyn,  but  was  used  up, 
very  weak ;  and  Timothy  Ingraham  [his  brother-in-law,  and  a  phy- 
sician] forbade  my  going  farther.  Spent  a  fortnight  with  the  dear 
folks  there,  and  came  home.  Have  been  very  weak  since,  unable  to 
v/rite  any  or  read  much.  I  cannot  preach  or  work  ;  walk  but  little, 
ride  horseback  a  little.  Cannot  go  to  Conference.  Sorry,  because 
my  character  may  be  arrested  for  not  going  to  Vicksburg.  Have 
materials  for  a  perfect  defense,  but  no  strength  to  prepare  it.  It 
must  be  left  to  the  Lord,  who  will  maintain  my  cause,  and  in  this 
case,  I  am  confident,  my  conduct  also.  ...  I  could  hardly  pass 
down  as  far  below  where  I  am  now  as  this  is  below  where  1  once 
was  without  following  my  dear  wife.  Six  years  I  I  did  not  then 
think,  despite  the  seeming  immortality  of  earth,  I  could  endure  the 
awful  grief.    Nay,  a  year  seemed  an  eternity. 

Four  months  later,  August  2,  he  reports  concerning 
his  health : 

Though  much  better  than  when  I  wrote  last,  I  am  far  from  well. 
My  head  is  subject  to  clouds  of  blood,  though  not  as  common  or  as 
prolonged  as  then.  My  health  doesn't  allow  me  to  preach  or  attend 
meetings,  save  Sunday  mornings,  and  write  book  notices  a  little.  It 
is  hard  to  do  nothing,  but  that  is  the  only  cure.  Dr.  Macomber 
thinks  it  will  be  a  year  before  I  can  get  at  work ;  I  hope  not. 

Under  date  of  January  17,  1867,  he  reports  further: 

I  am  at  my  mother's,  half  busy,  half  idle.  Since  last  I  wrote 
here  I  have  wandered  far,  going  to  Mr.  Goode's,  at  Amenia,  where 
I  spent  a  delightful  month  with  Jane's  [Mrs.  W.  M.  Ingraham's] 
and  Fannie's  [Mrs.  James  H.  Taft's]  families,  with  Amenia  friends. 
I  was  very  weak,  but  grew  stronger  while  there,  and  so  essayed  the 


288 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


West.  Spent  a  week  in  Rhinebeck,  at  Miss  Garrettson's,  and  then 
started  for  Lima,  where  I  stayed  a  week  ;  thence  to  Ann  Arbor, 
where  I  passed  ten  days  with  Otis  ;  thence  to  Dr.  Raymond's,  at 
Evanston,  where  I  enjoyed  ten  days  in  company  with  George  M 
Steele,  O.  Marcy,  Raymond,  and  the  families  of  the  last  two  ;  and 
thence  by  degrees  home  the  day  before  Thanksgiving.  I  am 
stronger,  better,  more  free  from  choking  and  suffusion  on  the  brain, 
but  am  still  poorly.  I  write  for  the  papers  an  hour  a  day,  but  not 
every  day  at  that.  I  ride  horseback,  walk,  and  am  busy  about  noth- 
ing. I  long  for  work,  yet  not  badly.  It  sometimes  seems  as  if  my 
nerves  were  cut,  I  am  so  helpless  to  grasp  and  push  the  work  I 
have  loved. 

This  improvement  went  steadily  forward  until  he  was 
able  two  months  later  to  undertake  a  responsible  task. 
Before  following  him  to  that  let  us  look  at  him  under 
other  lights. 


The  Reformer. 


289 


CHAPTER  XVI. 


THE  REFORMER. 


Early  Abolitionism— Incident  at  Amenia— Sermon  on  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill— Polit- 
ical Preaching— The  Caste  Spirit — Breadth  of  his  Views— Prophetic  Spirit— Defense  of 
John  Brown— Moral  Insight— John  A.  Andrew — Their  Relations— Defends  Governor 
Andrew— Condemns  him— Criticism  of  Public  Men— Letter  to  Governor  Claflin— Sup- 
ports the  Third  Party. 


HE  mind  ot  young  Gilbert  Haven  had  been  turned 


to  questions  of  social  reform  through  the  interest  of 
his  father  and  mother  in  the  antislavery  movement.  His 
father  had  been  a  Democrat  up  to  the  time  when  Rev. 
William  Rice  became  his  pastor  and  friend.  That  wise 
and  daring  advocate  of  the  rights  of  the  slave  had  con- 
siderable success  in  convincing  members  of  his  succes- 
sive pastoral  charges  of  the  righteousness  of  the  princi- 
ples of  Abolitionism,  and  of  the  duty  of  Christian  men 
to  speak,  pray,  and  vote,  so  as  to  make  these  principles 
potent  in  the  action  of  Church  and  State.  The  elder 
Gilbert  Haven  was  the  first  of  Mr.  Rice's  converts  to 
this  good,  though  then  greatly  despised,  cause.  The 
family  was  soon  wholly  devoted  to  these  views,  and  one 
and  all  did  what  they  could  for  their  advancement. 

Gilbert  Haven  maintained  his  fidelity  to  them  at 
school  and  in  college.  With  his  social  qualities  he  was 
naturally  drawn  into  a  great  deal  of  discussion  and  con- 
troversy over  them.  Thus  was  he  conducted  to  much 
silent  meditation  and  reflection  upon  the  relations  of 


13 


290  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

that  reform  to  the  fundamental  principles  of  free  gov- 
ernment, and  of  its  claims  upon  the  American  churches 
in  general,  and  upon  the  attitude  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church  in  particular  toward  those  claims. 
He  saw  that  the  State  was  far  below  its  ideals,  as  em- 
bodied in  its  own  great  declarations  upon  the  rights  of 
man,  and  that  the  various  religious  denominations  were 
very  remote  from  a  full  realization  of  Christ's  own  dec- 
laration. All  ye  are  brethren."  While  he  was  teaching 
at  Amenia  he  watched  with  the  keenest  eagerness  the 
course  of  public  events  in  their  bearing  upon  these 
questions.  It  is  reported  by  certain  people  that  on  one 
occasion  some  question  was  raised  about  the  presence  of 
a  colored  pupil  in  the  school,  and  that  Mr.  Haven  said 
to  the  trustees,  If  you  do  not  keep  her,  you  cannot 
retain  me."  The  Maiden  version  of  the  story  has  a 
more  probable  air,  and  is  that  Mr.  Haven  threatened  to 
give  the  obnoxious  pupil  his  personal  tuition  in  the 
seminary  office  to  assert  his  principles. 

During  the  last  year  of  his  residence  in  Amenia  (Sep- 
tember 13,  1850,)  the  general  subject  was  forced  upon 
the  public  mind  by  the  passage  through  Congress  of  the 
Fugitive  Slave  Bill.  The  agitation  was  widespread  and 
profound.  The  bill's  purport  is  too  well  known  to  require 
an  analysis  here.  It  was  regarded  at  the  North  as  a  need- 
less and  wicked  surrender  to  the  arrogant  demands  of 
the  slave  power.  Two  of  its  provisions  made  it  espe- 
cially abhorrent  to  the  Christian  people  of  the  free 
North.  One  commanded  them  to  withhold  aid  and 
comfort  from  slaves  fleeing  from  the  house  of  bondage, 


The  ReforiMER.  291 

and  the  other  made  it  a  legal  duty  to  assist  the  slave- 
catchers  in  their  bloodthirsty  hunt  for  the  hungry 
and  bleeding  victims  of  their  tyranny.  The  appar- 
ently deliberate  defiance  of  all  Christian  principle 
and  sympathy  of  these  brutal  demands  aroused  uni- 
versal indigng-tion  in  all  generous  and  many  ungenerous 
bosoms. 

But  power  was  on  the  side  of  the  oppressors.  The 
government  was  under  their  control.  The  great  Whig 
party  had  been  misled  by  its  greatest  leaders,  and  the 
Republicans  were  yet  unknown.  Some  pulpits  taught 
the  duty  of  submission  to  any  law  of  the  land.  Then 
Gilbert  Haven  found  his  voice.  He  was  not  in  haste  to 
speak,  hot  as  must  have  been  his  fiery  indignation  over 
this  treason  of  the  government  to  God  and  humanity. 
He  felt  the  crisis  had  come  when  he  must  show  himself 
a  man  in  regard  to  questions  not  likely  to  be  decided 
and  finally  settled  aright  for  a  long  while  to  come.  He 
took  three  months  to  consider  and  weigh  the  subject  in 
all  its  bearings,  and  to  so  shape  his  sermon  as  to  give  it 
all  possible  impressiveness.  The  sermon  discusses  at 
some  length  the  nature  of  our  obligation  to  be  loyal  to 
the  State,  and  of  our  obligation  to  obey  conscience. 
He  finds  the  latter  duty  sovereign  and  absolute,  so  that 
conscience  is  a  sort  of  home-god,  while  the  former  is  an 
obligation  which,  when  it  opposes  the  word  of  God  or 
obvious  dictates  of  natural  justice,  becomes  oppressive 
and  tyrannical,  and  so  loses  its  force.  We  cite  a  few 
ringing  sentences,  which  show  the  firm  discrimination 
with  which  this  line  is  drawn  : 


292 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


In  Christ,  not  in  the  Constitution,  must  we  put  our  trust.  On  his 
law  should  we  meditate,  not  on  that  which  again  nails  him,  scourged 
and  bleeding,  to  that  fatal  cross.  His  name  should  be  our  badge  of 
honor,  our  stamp  of  manhood.  Then,  and  then  only,  shall  we  truly 
render  not  only  unto  Csesar  the  things  which  are  Caesar's,  but  unto 
God,  also,  the  things  which  are  God's. 

I  have  endeavored  to  explain  to  you  the  grounds  of  our  relation  to 
civil  government,  the  extent  of  the  obligation  it  imposes,  the  modes 
of  determining  its  usurpation  of  rights  not  belonging  to  it,  and  our 
duty  when  it  assumes  unbestowed  prerogatives  for  unrighteous  ends. 

I  entreat  you.  as  you  love  the  Lord  your  God,  as  you  love  your 
neighbor,  as  you  desire  the  approval  of  a  good  conscience  now,  and 
the  approving  welcome  of  Christ  the  Judge  in  that  day,  I  entreat 
you,  declare  your  hostility  to  any  edict  or  system  that  retards  the 
progress  of  the  Gospel,  violates  the  teachings  of  conscience,  defrauds 
your  neighbor  of  rights  as  truly  his  as  they  are  yours,  and  as  far 
above  all  price  for  himself,  his  wife,  his  children,  as  they  are  to  you 
and  yours,  and  that  crowns  its  height  of  iniquity  by  blasphemously 
rejecting  the  laws  most  expressive  of  infinite  love  and  holiness,  the 
foundations  of  the  universe,  and  of  God  himself. 

Be  not  deceived  by  its  new  assumption  of  national  forms  and 
phrases,  the  robes  of  congressional  decree  and  presidential  signa- 
ture. How  will  that  signature  yet  glare  upon  its  author  like  Faust's 
in  the  legend.  It  will  stain  his  memory  to  all  generations.  Give  it 
no  support  in  any  form.  It  is  the  same  fiend  that  crucified  the 
Master.  It  is  ready  to  feast  its  ravenous  appetite  upon  the  bodies 
and  souls  of  your  brethren.  If  by  your  silence  or  connivance  it  re- 
gains its  strength,  it  will  only  use  it  for  the  transformation  of  the 
whole  country  into  one  vast  grave  of  liberty  and  law.  ...  If  allowed 
to  coil  itself  around  that  symbol  of  national  unity  it  will  not  relax  its 
hold  until  it  has  pressed  all  vitality  not  only  from  the  American  Con- 
stitution, but  also  from  the  American  people. 

When  Mr.  Haven  entered  definitely  on  the  work  of 
the  Christian  ministry,  it  became  his  duty  to  instruct 


The  Reformer.  293 

his  several  charges  in  respect  to  the  events  of  the  day  in 
the  poHtical  world,  so  far  as  they  brought  responsibili- 
ties upon  the  members  of  his  flock.  He  attended  to  this 
duty  by  frequent  incidental  references  to  current  events 
of  general  interest  to  public  morals  and  religion.  It 
struck  many  of  his  hearers  in  those  days  that  they  had 
never  heard  current  events  discussed  from  a  Christian 
stand-point,  with  any  thing  like  so  much  fullness,  impar- 
tiality, and  intelligence ;  and  that  Pastor  Haven  had  the 
keenest  sense  for  all  the  public  evils  under  which  the 
country  suffered,  and  a  marvelous  familiarity  with  all 
sides  of  the  slavery  question.  They  saw,  too,  that  he 
persistently  held  up  the  highest  ideals  of  duty  and  pos- 
sibility, both  for  the  Church  and  State,  and  that  it  was 
his  triumphant  belief  that  such  ideals  could  be  realized 
which  gave  him,  with  men  of  slow  faith,  the  repute  of  a 
visionary.    He  seemed  to  say  to  himself, 

"  Xot  failure  but  low  aim  is  crime." 

Never  was  a  man  freer  from  the  least  taint  of  assumed 
superiority  in  his  bearing  toward  others.  If  he  found  any 
body  who  suffered  public  contempt  unjustly,  he  showed 
them  the  most  marked  regard.  His  servants  were  usual- 
ly colored  people,  and  among  his  frequent  and  welcome 
guests  were  Revs.  J.  N.  Mars,  J.  W.  Jones,  Father  Hen- 
son,  Sojourner  Truth,  and  others  of  Ethiopian  origin 
and  hue.  They  were  just  as  welcome  at  his  fireside  and 
table  as  any  body,  and  none  of  them  ever  found  his  fra- 
ternal spirit  tainted  with  condescension. 

A  man  of  such  clearness  of  vision  could  not  fail  to  see 


294  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

that  his  own  treatment  of  the  negroes  was  unusual,  and 
that  in  general  they  were  victims  of  hostility,  indif- 
fference,  or  of  a  conscientious  but  artificial  kindl.ness. 
The  more  he  came  in  contact  with  the  world,  the 
stronger  his  feeling  became  that  the  unnatural  aversion 
of  whites  to  blacks  must  be  overcome  entirely  before 
the  slave  would  obtain  the  hearty  championship  he 
needed,  the  freedman  that  companionship  which  was  his 
due,  or  the  Church  and  nation  that  moral  unification 
which  is  at  once  the  condition  and  symptom  of  their 
supreme  success.  Without  this  he  felt  that  democracy 
had  not  achieved  its  promise  nor  Christianity  its  highest 
hopes.  He  threw  these  strong  convictions  into  a  Fast- 
day  sermon,  first  preached  at  Wilbraham  in  April,  1854, 
and  repeated  later  at  Roxbury,  in  1858,  and  also  at 
Forsyth  Street  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  in  New 
York  city;  the  sermon  is  founded  on  the  text,  We  are 
verily  guilty  concerning  our  brother."  Gen.  xlii,  21.  We 
give  the  author's  argument  : 

Foundation  for  American  slavery.  I.  Not  in  man  as  man,  but  in 
his  color  or  origin.  Scripture  stolen  to  array  an  idol.  This  color 
is  declared  to  be  a  mark  of  degradation  and  separation.  11.  This 
feeling,  i.  General;  2.  Deep-rooted;  3.  Unnatural.  Because  (i.)  not 
felt  toward  any  other  class  of  men.  (2.)  The  negroes  have  the  gifts 
of  music,  manners,  the  culinary  art,  aptness  of  imitation,  wit  and 
humor,  patience,  and  sunniness  of  temper.  (3.)  No  repugnance  to 
this  color  is  seen  elsewhere  than  in  America.  (4.)  No  disunity  in 
spiritual  nature.  (5.)  Caused  by  social  condition.  (6.)  Contrary  to 
the  Scriptures.  4.  This  feeling  is  the  chief  bulwark  of  American 
slavery.  South  could  not  resist  the  North  were  the  latter  free  from 
this  prejudice.    III.  How  shall  it  be  cured  ?    i.  Cease  to  dwell  on 


The  Reformer. 


295 


the  distinction  of  color.  2.  Welcome  those  of  this  hue  to  your  soci- 
ety. 3.  Encourage  them  to  enter  all  branches  of  trade.  IV.  Result : 
intermarriage,  its  right  and  fitness.  True  marriage.  Shakspeare's 
foresight  and  courage.    Othello  and  Desdemona." 

It  will  be  seen  that  this  preacher,  but  just  admitted  to 
Conference  and  with  his  way  yet  to  make,  had  the  se- 
rene courage  to  undertake  a  perilous  enterprise  at  the 
outset  of  his  career.  He  dared  to  tell  his  people,  sitting 
in  their  cushioned  pews  in  their  pleasant  churches,  that 
many  of  them  were  as  verily  guilty  concerning  their 
brother  "  in  slavery  as  the  despised  and  abhorred  slave- 
holder himself.  The  solemnity  of  tone  which  pervades 
the  discourse  is  shown  in  the  opening  words : 

We  shall  not  dwell  especially  to-day  on  the  crime  which  still  pos- 
sesses our  land,  after  the  usual  manner  of  its  consideration.  Let  us 
turn  from  the  dreadful  fruit  as  it  ripens  in  that  heavy  Southern  air, 
and  examine  its  seed-grain  that  is  growing  profusely  in  every  heart. 
The  corner-stone  of  this  system  is  prejudice  against  color.  Upon 
this  almost  universal  feeling  the  slave-holder  builds  an  impregnable 
fortress.  Slavery  will  never  be  abolished  until  it  gives  way.  As  one 
that  must  render  an  account  to  God  for  what  I  say,  I  shall  speak. 
As  those  that  must  give  like  account  to  that  same  God,  I  beseech 
you,  take  heed  how  ye  hear.  Though  I  assail  a  deep-rooted  but 
God-forbidden  sentiment,  as  you  would  obey  the  command  of  Christ, 
"  Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbor  as  thyself,"  I  entreat  you  to  give  the 
subject  your  candid  and  Christian  attention. 

Thus  does  he  leap  upon  those  who  would  defend 
slavery  on  scriptural  grounds  : 

Scripture  is  stolen  to  deck  a  false  idol.  It  is  a  new  argument  for 
an  old  sin,  an  argument  without  any  antitype  in  history,  or  any 


296  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


authority  in  the  Word  of  God.  ...  It  is  the  child  of  the  American 
Saxon,  not  of  the  British.  It  was  born  on  our  soil,  of  our  lusts,  of 
which  it  is  the  meanest  offspring. 

Away  with  all  such  mockery  of  God  and  his  Gospel !  Stand  forth, 
transgressor,  in  thy  own  vileness  !  "  Lie  down  in  thy  shame,  and 
let  thy  sins  cover  thee."  Pretend  not  to  shelter  thyself  in  the  Word 
of  God.  It  burns  with  intolerable  flame  against  all  such  hypocrisy. 
No  one  ever  before  made  such  a  cowardly  excuse  for  his  indulgence 
in  avarice,  power,  and  lust.  No  sinner  m  all  the  Bible  ever  arrayed 
his  wicked  passions  in  such  a  cloak  of  holiness.  It  was  left  for  pro- 
fessors and  preachers  of  the  Gospel  in  this  free  and  Christian  Amer- 
ica, in  this  nineteenth  century  after  the  coming  of  Christ,  to  weave 
such  a  garment  of  sanctity  for  the  body  of  their  death.  How  will 
He  whom  they  thus  mock  put  them  to  open  shame  for  this  profana- 
tion of  his  name  and  claims  ! 

Very  directly  does  the  preacher  bring  this  sin  home 
to  the  business  and  bosoms  of  his  Northern  hearers  : 

This  sin  of  caste  prevails  here  as  much  as  where  it  has  borne  its 
legitimate  fruit,  the  transforming  of  this  separated,  darker,  and 
inferior  class  into  the  property  of  the  lighter  and  inferior.  To  its  con- 
sideration we  of  the  North  are  especially  called.  It  is  a  sin  at  our  own 
doors,  and  in  our  own  hearts.  It  makes  us  naked  before  our  ene- 
mies. It  ties  our  tongues  before  their  taunts.  It  must  be  exter- 
minated before  God  gives  us  perfect  and  perpetual  peace.  It  is  the 
most  unnatural,  and  destructive  of  all  the  sins  of  the  nation. 

I  could  not  have  mentioned  another  subject  which  would  have 
excited  such  instant  and  profound  loathing  as  this.  I  rejoice  that 
you  have  so  patiently  listened  to  its  unpalatable  truths.  I  believe 
it  is  because  reason  commands  you,  though  your  feelings  yet  refuse 
obedience.  Let  reason  have  her  perfect  work,  and  see  if  she  cannot 
subdue  this  feeling  to  herself,  and  convert  it  to  the  perfect  truth.  .  .  . 
The  presence  of  a  drop  of  this  blood  excludes  its  possessor  from  all 
society  with  whites.  North  or  South. 


The  Reformer. 


297 


A  gentleman  in  a  New  England  town  brought  an  elegant  and 
wealthy  bride  home  from  the  West  Indies,  who  was  slightly  tinged 
with  this  hue.  Her  wealth,  culture,  and  beauty  could  not  secure  her 
admission  into  a  society  below  that  in  which  she  had  moved  at  home, 
and  she  remained  in  seclusion  until  death  admitted  her  to  the  equal 
society  of  heaven.   These  instances  could  be  reproduced  every-where. 

Their  social  status  has  wrought  this  prejudice  in  us.  It  is  the 
lowest  any  class  can  occupy  toward  their  fellows.  They  are  slaves. 
And  as  the  Egyptians  loathed  the  Jews,  their  whiter  neighbors, 
because  they  were  their  slaves,  as  the  Greeks  and  Romans  shrunk 
from  fraternal  communion  with  their  slaves,  though  of  their  own 
blood,  so  we  have  allowed  this  condition  to  work  in  us  its  baleful 
power.  They  are  slaves,  bought  and  sold.  We  are  free.  The  sep- 
aration is  immeasurable. 

Hence  arises  American  caste.  The  slave  is  black.  The  free  are 
white.  If  the  slave  is  black,  then  the  black  man  is,  and  of  right 
ought  to  be,  a  slave.  If  the  black  man  ought  to  be  a  slave,  and  the 
white  man  free,  then  there  is  a  vital,  natural  and  eternal  distinction 
between  them,  a  great  gulf  fixed  by  God.  Thus  the  diabolic  argu- 
ment is  framed,  and  our  consciences  seared  as  with  a  hot  iron. 

To  cure  this  terrible  and  wicked  prejudice,  Mr.  Haven 

would  have  all  good  men  encourage  these  social  offcasts 

by  taking  no  more  note  of  the  color  of  their  skin  than  of 

that  of  the  eyes.   He  would  have  Christians  admit  them 

to  their  homes,  tables,  and  companionship  on  the  same 

conditions  that  others  are.    Not  because  they  are  black 

must  they  be  so  kindly  treated,  but  because  they  are 

good,  pure,    attractive    in  appearance    and  manners. 

Where  such  traits  appear  in  colored  people  they  should 

be  allowed  to  open  the  way  to  cordial  and  sympathetic 

social  relations.    He  gives  some  glimpses  of  his  own 

relations  with  them  : 
13* 


298 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


But  last  Sabbath  I  had  the  pleasure  of  introducing  a  brother-min- 
ister, a  fugitive  slave,  to  the  table  where  I  was  a  guest ;  and,  though 
many  others  surrounded  that  table,  none  surpassed  or  equaled  him 
in  giving  animation  to  the  hour.  Among  the  many  who  honor  my 
house  and  table  with  their  presence,  none  have  more  refinement, 
originality  of  thought  and  language,  rich  and  playful  natures,  and 
none  give  greater  elevation  to  the  society,  than  some  of  these  de- 
spised men  and  women,  You  lose  some  of  the  best  opportunities 
to  enliven  and  improve  your  social  life  by  refusing  these  kindred 
spirits  an  equal  place  at  your  board.  If  you  could  have  the  humor 
of  an  Irving,  the  wit  of  a  Holmes,  or  the  refinement  of  an  Everett  to 
adorn  your  table,  you  would  feel  that  you  were  exalted  by  their 
presence.  I  know  some  of  these  so-called  repulsive  men  and  women 
whose  wit  is  as  brilliant  as  Mrs.  Stowe's,  whose  manners  are  as 
refined  as  Everett's,  whose  conversation  is  a  perfect  mine  of  genial 
sportfulness  and  clear-headed  wisdom. 

Mr.  Haven  would  have  had  all  the  avenues  and 
enaoluments  of  business,  professional  and  public  life 
thrown  open  to  them  on  terms  of  perfect  equality  with 
all  others.  That  this  course  of  action  would  often  re- 
sult in  marriage  between  whites  and  blacks  he  not  only 
recognized  but  heralded  as  a  desirable  consequence  of 
his  principles  : 

My  friends,  all  I  have  said  is  I  am  aware,  very  unpalatable  to 
you.  It  would  be  insufferable  if  spoken  two  hundred  miles  south  of 
us.  It  could  not  have  been  spoken  below  Washington,  nor  there 
save  by  one  protected  by  the  State  he  represents.  We  must  not  fear 
to  declare  the  whole  counsel  of  God  in  this  matter.  The  question 
that  has  been  uppermost  in  your  hearts  in  all  this  discourse,  that  will 
leap  from  your  lips  as  soon  as  their  enforced  silence  is  broken,  let 
us  briefly  and  calmly  consider.  When  Go/ernor  Banks,  by  whose 
authority  we  meet  to-day,  was  asked  by  the  southern  catechist.  when 


The  Reformer. 


299 


he  was  a  candidate  for  the  speaker's  chair,  in  order  to  cover  him 
with  infamy,  whether  he  beheved  in  amalgamation,  with  a  prompt- 
ness, independence,  and  courage  that  but  few  ministers  of  the  Gos- 
pel, and  fewer  of  any  other  class,  would  have  exhibited,  he  an- 
swered, "  that  the  more  powerful  race  would  absorb  the  weaker,  and 
it  was  yet  an  undecided  question  of  physiology  which  was  the 
stronger."  So,  when  you  ask  us  if  we  believe  in  the  intermarriage 
of  the  races,  we  answer,  "  True  marriage  is  a  divine  institution." 
Such  hearts  are  knit  together  by  the  hand  that  originally  wove 
them  in  separate  but  half-finished  webs.  God  makes  this  unity.  If 
he  does  not,  then  it  is  a  conventional  human  thing,  subject  to  the 
whims  of  human  society.  As  respects  such  marriage,  all  I  need  to  say 
is,  "  It  is  none  of  our  business.  It  is  the  business  of  the  two  souls 
that  are  thus  made  one  by  the  goodness  and  greatness  of  their  Cre- 
ator." Parents  have  advisory  power  to  a  certain  extent.  If  it  is 
not  of  God,  but  only  of  transient  passion,  of  pride,  of  ambition,  ot 
desire  for  wealth,  then  parents  may  have  complete,  or  nearly  com- 
plete, control  until  their  children  have  attained  legal  age.  But  if 
heart  is  one  with  heart,  then,  with  Shakspeare,  must  you  say : 

"  Let  me  not  to  the  marriage  of  true  souls 
Admit  impediment." 

That  greatest  of  poets  and  of  thinkers  carries  this  principle  to  its 
full  expression  in  the  marriage  of  the  most  womanly  of  his  women 
and  the  most  manly  of  his  men.  He  sets  the  loves  of  Desdemona 
and  Othello  far  above  the  range  of  groveling  criticism.  The  whole 
story  of  that  event  seems  to  have  been  made  for  our  land  and  hour. 
It  is  a  protest  against  this  curse  such  as  no  subsequent  poet  in  all 
literature  has  ever  attained.  Read  it  and  see  the  feelings  of  the 
American  heart  painted  and  denounced  by  this  master  of  human 
nature. 

Desdemona's  father,  a  rich  and  proud  Venetian,  full  of  the  spirit 
of  caste,  like  many  such  a  father  in  this  nation  to-day,  when  he 
learned  of  his  daughter's  secret  marriage,  cries  out  thus  against  her 
distinguished  and  noble  husband  : 


300 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


"O  thou  foul  thief,  where  hast  thou  stowed  my  daughter? 

Damned  as  thou  art,  thou  hast  enchanted  her  ; 

For  I'll  refer  me  to  all  things  of  sense, 

If  she  in  chains  of  magic  were  not  bound, 

Whether  a  maid  so  tender,  fair,  and  happy, 

So  opposite  to  marriage,  that  she  shunned 

The  wealthy  curled  darlings  of  her  nation. 

Would  ever  have,  to  incur  the  general  mock, 

Run  from  lier  guardage  to  the  sooty  bosom 

Of  such  a  thing  as  thou  ?" 

In  his  unrestrained  rage  he  breaks  out  again : 

"  That  she,  in  spite  of  nature, 
Of  years,  of  country,  credit,  every  thing. 
To  fall  in  love  with  what  she  feared  to  look  on ! 
It  is  a  judgment  maimed  and  most  imperfect 
That  will  confess  perfection  so  could  err 
Against  all  rules  of  nature,  and  must  be  driven 
To  find  out  practices  of  cunning  hell 
Why  this  should  be." 

To  this  Venetian  American,  Othello  before  the  duke  makes  reply 
— a  reply  so  dignified,  so  manly,  so  majestic  in  rhythm  and  in  feel- 
ing, that  it  seems  as  if  Shakspeare  felt  that  he  was  pleading  before 
God  and  humanity  against  the  contemptible  prejudices  of  this  age 
and  nation.  The  great  duke,  at  the  close  of  Othello's  speech,  says 
truly,  as  you  and  every  one  unprejudiced  would  have  said  : 

"  I  think  this  tale  would  win  my  daughter  too." 

Even  Brabantio,  her  father,  softens  in  his  prejudices,  and  declares, 

"  If  she  confess  that  she  was  half  the  wooer. 
Destruction  on  my  head,  if  my  bad  blame 
Light  on  the  man." 

And  after  Desdemona's  frank  acknowledgment  of  her  love,  he 
generously  gave  her  to  him  "with  all  his  heart,"  an  example  many 
a  wrathful  father  among  us  will  yet  faithfully  follow. 


The  Reformer. 


301 


In  all  cases  of  true  affection  this  higher  law  than  man's  must  have 
sway.  If  God  makes  such  marriages  between  the  white  and  the 
colored,  who  art  thou  that  refusest  to  bless  his  banns  ?  Such  mar- 
riages, heaven-made  and  blessed,  have  occurred.  In  Jamaica,  in 
Brazil,  in  Mexico,  happy  souls,  whose  outward  hue  is  varied,  whose 
inward  blood  arises  from  remote  fountains,  are  made  one  in  perfect 
marriage. 

Here  and  there  a  rich  man  rises  superior  to  society,  and  abides 
honorably  by  his  love  and  vows,  though  no  minister  will  consecrate 
them.  Said  a  clergyman  to  Mrs.  Johnson,  the  God-given  wife  of 
Vice-President  Richard  M.  Johnson,  "  You  cannot  join  the  Church 
because  you  are  not  married."  She  told  her  husband  what  had 
been  said  to  her.  He  replied,  "  Tell  your  minister  that  I  am  ready, 
and  have  always  been,  to  be  publicly  married,  and  ask  him  to  come 
and  marry  us  this  very  night."  The  clergyman  dared  not  do  his 
duty,  even  at  the  request  of  one  so  high  in  station.  Thus  he  kept  a 
Christian  woman  out  of  the  Church  for  a  sin  which  he  and  his 
Church  had  fastened  upon  her.  No  wonder  her  husband,  in  his 
official  career,  hurled  indignant  epithets  at  the  Church,  and  died 
without  its  pale. 

I  have  spoken,  my  friends,  with  great  plainness  of  speech,  my 
honest,  sincere,  and  long-held  convictions  on  this  subject.  I  believe 
that  caste  is  the  great  sin  of  this  nation,  and  that  it  is  the  great  duty 
of  every  one  to  extirpate  it  first  from  himself,  and  then  from  every 
heart  which  he  can  influence.  The  reform  must  begin  here.  I  re- 
joice that  it  has  begun.  We  have  abolished  from  the  statute  books 
laws  forbidding  intermarriage,  creating  separate  schools,  and  de- 
priving them  of  the  rights  of  suffrage  and  office.  In  the  eye  of  the 
law  they  are  equal ;  but  the  Gospel  must  effect  "  what  the  law  can- 
not do  in  that  it  is  weak  through  the  flesh."  It  must  work  its  per- 
fect work.  We  must  feel  the  brotherhood  of  man.  We  must  sym- 
pathize with  the  most  oppressed  of  the  human  family. 

It  will  be  seen  by  these  quotations  how  completely 
Gilbert  Haven  rested  his  doctrine  of  the  equality  of  all 


302 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


men  upon  the  Gospel  of  Christ,  and  in  what  a  generous 
spirit  he  carried  it  out  in  his  own  deahngs  with  all  men, 
especially  the  weak,  the  despoiled,  the  proscribed,  and 
the  oppressed.  It  will  be  seen  that  this  comprehensive 
exposition  of  the  duties  of  the  State  and  the  Church 
was  made  in  those  youthful  days  of  his  ministry  when 
Pierce  and  Buchanan  were  Presidents  of  the  United 
States,  and  when  the  churches  still  had  a  very  great 
repugnance  to  such  practical  applications  of  the  Sav- 
iour's doctrines. 

Remarkable,  indeed,  was  his  faith  in  the  speedy  over- 
throw of  slavery.  In  his  first  sermon  he  spoke  of  the 
efforts  of  the  slave  power  to  assert  its  authority  in  the 
Fugitive  Slave  bill  as  "  the  expiring  struggles  of  one  of 
the  most  fell  destroyers  of  human  happiness."  So  he 
closes  his  sermon  on  the  "  Nebraska  Bill,"  entitled  "The 
Death  of  Freedom,"  with  cries  that  herald  a  sure  and 
speedy  resurrection  : 

Roll  away  the  stone  from  the  door  of  the  sepulcher  !  Be  vigilant, 
be  tearless,  be  prayerful,  be  believing.  We  shall  triumph,  not 
through  disunion,  not  through  perpetual  feuds,  but  through  the  help 
and  Spirit  of  God.  Some  Washington  or  Jefferson  will  yet  arise, 
who  will  lead  the  North  and  the  South  to  the  battle  and  the  triumph 
of  true  freedom  and  true  democracy.  The  South  will  not  forever 
keep  back,  and  our  Jerusalem,  the  seat  of  this  death,  shall  be  the 
seat  of  its  revival  in  perfect  power  and  glory.  .  .  . 

Labor  vvith  a  largeness  of  soul  that  seeks  not  only  this  grand  and 
spacious  land  for  freedom,  but  freemen  every-where  in  a  free  land. 
Labor  till  every  yoke  is  broken  and  every  family  unbroken,  until  the 
feet  of  tender  women  no  more  sow  blood  along  the  paths  their  task- 
masters drive  them,  until  their  hearts  no  longer  shed  richer  drops  of 


The  Reformer. 


303 


sacred  blood  over  sundered  families  and  desolate  households — soon 
to  be  reaped  in  what  terrible  judgments  upon  ourselves,  our  nation, 
our  posterity,  God  only  knows,  and  the  future  alone  can  tell.  We 
may  go  into  deeper  blackness,  but  shall  come  forth  into  brighter  light. 

Soon  after  John  Brown  had  been  hung,  (December  2, 
1859,)  Charles  Sumner,  the  illustrious  Senator  from  Mas- 
sachusetts, spoke  in  a  private  company  in  Springfield, 
Mass.,  concerning  the  dead  hero  and  the  effect  of  his 
bold  attack  upon  slavery.  Of  course,  Mr.  Sumner  did 
full  justice  to  the  heroic  qualities  of  John  Brown,  but 
he  condemned  his  judgment  in  taking  the  course  he  did 
at  Harper's  Ferry.  Said  he,  "  Slavery,  so  far  as  human 
judgment  can  forecast,  is  destined  to  live  a  long  while, 
and  exert  a  vast  influence  upon  this  country.  Probably 
the  youngest  person  in  this  room  will  not  live  to  see  its 
destruction.  Yet  it  will  be  destroyed  in  the  end, 
though  not  through  such  proceedings  as  John  Brown's. 
They  only  hinder  instead  of  hastening  the  coming  of 
that  day."  The  youngest  person  "  in  the  room  him- 
self reported  this  statement  of  the  great  Senator.  And 
so  many  of  the  best  and  most  gifted  devotees  of  universal 
freedom  thought  and  said.  But  six  days  after  Brown's 
execution  Gilbert  Haven  said  in  "  Zion's  Herald:  " 

Some  say  he  was  mad,  some  say  he  was  bloody-minded.  He  took 
the  sword  ;  it  is  right  that  he  should  perish  by  the  sword.  Was  he 
insane  }  Was  he  a  monomaniac  ?  Did  he  labor  under  a  mental 
hallucination  ?  So  some  of  his  many  friends  represent ;  but  if  so, 
why  this  mighty,  instinctive,  irrepressible  approval  ?  Why  do  our 
hearts  belie  our  lips  ?  Why  do  we  have  to  put  our  nature  under  the 
hatchways  when  we  condemn  him  ?  .  .  . 


304 


Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 


It  ought  not  to  be  a  hard  thing  to  understand  John  Brown.  .  .  , 
His  words  are  so  plain  that  he  who  runs  may  read  them.  Why  is 
not  this  central  act  apprehensible  ?  Simply  because  we  have  not 
yet  dared  to  study  it.  We  have  been  as  afraid  of  it  as  they  of  him. 
He  was  too  ripe  for  us,  but  not  for  the  cause.  The  instinct  of  every 
heart  declares  the  latter,  the  perplexity  of  every  head  the  former.  .  .  . 

The  slain  knew  he  was  not  slain.  No  man  ever  went  to  a  mar- 
tyT's  death  with  such  assurance  of  success  ;  no  man  ever  had  better 
grounds.  And  that  red  slayer,  the  slave  power,  that  has  driven 
Governor  Wise  to  wash  his  unwilUng  hands  in  this  saintly  blood, 
already  beholds  the  dread  Avenger  come  again.  They  are  not  eat- 
ing their  festal  feasts  of  victory  without  seeing  the  terrible  specter, 
and  they  cry,  with  chattering  teeth, 

"  Hence,  horrible  shadow  ! 

Unreal  mockery,  hence.    The  times  have  been 

That  when  the  brains  were  out  the  man  would  die, 

And  so  an  end.    But  now  they  rise  again 

With  twenty  mortal  murthers  in  their  crowns 

To  push  us  from  our  stools  ..." 

Great  signs  in  the  religious,  the  political,  the  social  heavens  be- 
token the  overthrow  of  slavery.  All  forces  are  uniting  against  her 
—Church  and  State,  society  and  civilization— and,  like  every  tyrant, 
she  loses  ever)-  thing,  and  loses  it  instantly,  if  she  loses  her  Water- 
loo. Ere  long  she  will  lose  her  Waterloo.  Within  the  first  century 
of  our  national  life  she  will  disappear.  .  .  . 

Almost  John  Brown's  last  act  was  one  whose  fitness  none  can 
question,  whose  large  lesson  all  must  learn.  As  he  left  the  jail  he 
saw  a  slave-woman  and  her  babe  near  its  door,  and  as  she,  with  a 
smiling  countenance,  addressed  him,  he,  stooping  over,  kissed  her 
babe.  Who  of  that  crowd  could  have  done  that  ?  Who  of  the 
readers  of  the  stor>'  ?  He,  face  to  face  with  his  coffin,  face  to  face 
with  his  God,  recognizes  the  cause  for  which  he  was  to  die,  and 
teaches  us  the  lesson  this  nation  is  set  to  learn,  and  to  teach  all 
other  nations — the  union  and  fraternity  of  man. 


« 


The  Reformer. 


305 


It  is  noteworthy  that  this  perception  of  the  speedily 
approaching  end  of  the  long  dominion  of  slavery  in  this 
country  runs  through  this  entire  volume  of  sermons. 
Nowhere  does  the  preacher  express  a  doubt  of  this 
swift  result,  nowhere  show  fears  that  the  great  sin  will 
renew  its  hold  and  freshen  its  vitality.  It  was  his  in- 
tense faith  in  the  living  God,  under  whose  providential 
care  all  things  move  onward  to  their  appointed  ends, 
which  gave  him  such  a  clear  insight  into  the  march  of 
events  in  his  own  times.  After  his  long  and  careful  and 
loving  study  of  Paris  he  closed  his  observations  in  these 
terms  : 

We  could  linger  here  for  hours  and  muse  and  moralize  on  the  life 
that  has  sailed  haughtily  down  these  avenues  and  through  these  halls, 
fluttered  and  fled.  One  need  not  go  to  Rome  or  Egypt  to  see  the 
lessons  divine  righteousness  teaches  to  men.  No  rulers  were  so 
openly  voluptuous  as  the  French.  The  finest  of  these  buildings  was 
built  by  a  king  for  his  mistress.    So  was  it  at  Versailles. 

The  Pantheon  was  built  by  Louis  XV.  for  the  Duchess  of  Pompa- 
dour. The  naked  form  of  Diana  of  Poitiers  Henry  II.  put  into  the 
window  of  his  chapel  at  Vincennes.  The  paramour  of  Henry  IV. 
had  like  publicity  of  honor,  which  is  shame.  No  wonder  that  God 
gave  such  blood  to  be  licked  by  the  dogs  of  Paris,  as  he  did  that  of 
the  house  of  Ahab  in  an  ancient  Paris.  No  one  has  tears  to  shed 
over  the  fate  of  the  Bourbons.  A  sterner  blood,  but  as  impure,  as 
proud,  and  more  despotic,  has  supplanted  it.  It  too  shall  follow 
that  which  it  has  supplanted  to  a  tearless  grave.  Had  this  people 
religion,  real  liberty  from  such  rulers  would  soon  follow. 

Those  were  intelligent  eyes  before  which  hovered  in 
1862  a  vision  of  Sedan.  It  was  the  like  profound  spir- 
itual vision  of  the  needs  of  mankind  and  the  designs  of 


3o6  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

God  that  imparted  to  Mr.  Haven's  conceptions  of  the 
work  to  be  done  in  behalf  of  the  slave  and  free  black  a 
breadth  and  grandeur  such  as  few  antislavery  men  at- 
tained and  proclaimed.  From  his  point  of  view  most 
of  the  remedies  for  the  kindred  social  evils  of  which 
slavery  was  only  one  of  the  worst  forms  were  very  cheap 
and  inadequate.  Intemperance,  the  opium  trade,  war, 
aristocracy,  monarchy,  and  all  other  organized  forms  of 
human  selfishness,  he  held  to  be  hostile  to  any  real  hu- 
man equality  and  fraternity.  The  various  special  re- 
forms which  he  championed  all  had  their  life  to  his 
mind  in  the  principles  of  the  Gospel. 

During  a  series  of  years  at  this  period  of  his  life  Mr. 
Haven  was  brought  into  contact  with  leading  men  in 
public  affairs  in  Massachusetts  in  respect  to  public  and 
reformatory  questions.  One  of  the  chief  of  these  was 
John  A.  Andrew,  the  famous  War  Governor  of  Massa- 
chusetts. He  had  heard  Mr.  Andrew  lecture  on  some 
occasion,  soon  after  his  admission  to  the  bar,  and  had 
marked  him  as  a  man  sure  to  rise  to  high  influence ;  and 
he  had  watched  the  brilliant  career  in  its  general  out- 
lines until  it  led  to  the  gubernatorial  chair  of  the  Com- 
monwealth of  Massachusetts.  Up  to  this  point  there 
had  been  no  direct  relations  between  the  two  men. 

One  day  a  messenger  invited  Mr.  Haven  to  call  at  the 
office  of  the  governor.  The  latter  gave  him  a  cordial 
reception,  and  at  once  proceeded  to  the  purpose  of  the 
interview.  He  said  that  he  wished  to  have  a  confiden- 
tial conversation  in  relation  to  the  temperance  question. 
He  stated  that  he  had  no  great  confidence  in  some  of 


The  Reformer.  307 

the  conspicuous  advocates  of  that  cause.  Many  of  them 
hoped  to  reach  public  notice  and  position  without  any 
conspicuous  fitness  on  other  grounds  ;  one  was  trying 
to  float  an  unpopular  theology  on  the  waves  of  a  popu- 
lar reform,  and  yet  others  had  relations  to  the  matter 
which  made  them  interested  advisers.  Hence  he  had 
sent  for  Mr.  Haven  to  learn  just  what  the  temperance 
people  really  wanted,  and  to  see  if  the  legislation  and 
administration  of  the  State  could  not  be  so  shaped  as  to 
meet  all  reasonable  demands. 

The  governor  went  on  to  explain  what  he  would  be 
willing  to  attempt  in  that  direction.  He  would  gladly 
enforce  a  pretty  rigid  license  law,  also  a  law  closing  all 
bars  on  Sundays,  and  he  would  procure  the  appoint- 
ment of  a  State  police  force,  nowise  dependent  on  the 
temporary  popular  opinion,  who  should  put  the  actual 
laws  into  rigid  execution.  Now  was  not  this  as  much 
as  candid  temperance  people  could  expect,  and,  consid- 
ering every  thing,  had  a  right  to  expect  ?  Would  such 
measures  satisfy  them  ?    If  not,  what  would  ? 

Mr.  Haven  frankly  admitted  that  the  measures  pro- 
posed, if  carried  out  in  the  spirit  suggested,  would  be  a 
great  improvement  on  the  condition  of  things  then  ex- 
isting, and  confessed  his  belief  that  the  governor  would 
put  as  much  vigor  as  good  faith  into  the  work.  But  he 
said  the  temperance  people  wanted  strict  prohibition 
of  the  entire  traffic,  would  have  prohibition,  and  ought 
to  have  prohibition.  He  not  only  insisted  that  public 
opinion  was  quite  in  favor  of  such  measures,  but  that 
any  bold  leader  who  would  bring  sufficient  ability  and 


3o8  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

tact  to  the  task  would  not  only  do  a  vast  service  to 
public  morals,  but  gain  immortal  honor  for  himself. 
He  urged  Governor  Andrew  to  undertake  the  high  and 
glorious  service.  The  governor  said,  ''Any  thing  I 
think  I  ought  to  do,  I  dare  to  do.  But  I  am  not  a  tem- 
perance man  in  the  popular  acceptation  of  the  word. 
It  would  be  insincere  for  me  to  take  the  course  you 
point  out." 

Thus  the  two  men  came  to  understand  each  other  on 
this  great  social  question.  But  Governor  Andrew,  al- 
though disappointed  in  the  purpose  of  the  conversation, 
and  perhaps  somewhat  taken  aback  by  the  earnest  ex- 
hortations of  the  visitor,  appears  to  have  been  favorably 
impressed  with  Mr.  Haven.  The  two  had  many  nat- 
ural points  of  contact.  Both  were  men  of  open,  frank, 
hearty,  generous,  sympathetic,  and  courageous  nature. 
Each  loved  fun  and  humor,  and  overflowed  with  bright 
talk  and  witty  stories.  Then  on  all  political  and  anti- 
slavery  topics  they  were  ultra  in  about  equal  degrees. 
Here  their  agreement  was  perfect.  Governor  Andrew 
was  a  man  of  strong  religious  convictions,  and  more 
emotional  than  ^Ir.  Haven  in  his  religious  manifesta- 
tions. He  was  a  friend  of  Father  Taylor,  long  a 
teacher  in  his  Sunday-school,  and  even  when  governor 
was  glad  and  proud  to  act  as  Secretary  of  the  Boston 
Port  Society,  which  sustained  Father  Taylor's  chapel. 
Governor  Andrew's  pastor,  Rev.  James  Freeman  Clarke, 
says  of  him  : 

He  loved  to  go  to  Father  Taylor's  conference  meeting's  and  talk 
with  the  sailors,  and  listen  to  the  rough  sons  of  the  ocean,  when 

I 


The  Reformer. 


309 


made  ^tender  by  the  sense  of  God's  presence,  and  by  the  softening 
influence  of  the  place  and  hour.  Also  when,  as  he  said,  he  wanted 
"a  good  warm  time,"  he  would  go  to  the  meetings  of  the  colored 
Baptist  Church,  of  which  Brother  Grimes  was  pastor.  And  Mr. 
Grimes  always  came  to  Andrew  when  he  needed  any  thing  for  his 
people.  In  that  church,  with  the  colored  people,  John  A.  Andrew 
would  often  be  found,  sitting  among  them,  joining  heartily  in  their 
hymns,  or  listening  with  his  open  sympathizing  expression  of  face  to 
their  prayers  and  exhortations.  .  .  . 

In  our  Church  Andrew  was  always  foremost  in  all  plans  and 
movements  of  benevolence  and  reform.  His  contributions  were 
large  and  generous  for  the  freed  men,  for  the  street  boys,  for  the 
poor,  for  the  home  for  aged  colored  women.  He  always  did  the 
most  for  those  most  forlorn  and  helpless  ;  his  maxim  being,  Aux 
plus  desherites  le  plus  d' amour,  "  Most  love  to  the  most  forlorn." 

Mr.  Haven  both  admired  and  loved  Governor  Andrew, 
and  the  latter  fully  appreciated  the  faithful  conscience 
which  would  not  let  the  minister  consent  to  his  tem- 
perance measures.  When  Grace  Church  was  re-opened 
as  a  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  Governor  Andrew  was 
present,  and  made  a  very  neat  and  felicitous  address, 
though,  as  he  said,  too  weary  to  be  present.  It  will  be 
seen  that  for  years  Governor  Andrew  and  Mr.  Haven 
had  been  wont  to  treat  worthy  and  intelligent  colored 
men  just  like  any  other  worthy  and  intelligent  men. 
Among  these  was  the  Rev.  Leonard  A.  Grimes,  who 
had  then  been  for  seventeen  years  pastor  of  a  Baptist 
Church  in  Boston.  This  worthy  citizen  had  won  general 
favor  for  his  ministerial  fidelity^  his  patriotic  dev^otion 
to  the  Government  by  aiding  the  enlistment  of  men  of 
color,  securing  the  election  to  Congress  of  Anson  Bur- 


310 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


lingame  and  Mr.  Hooper,  and  refusing  to  allow  hi^  own 
name  to  be  used  in  a  ward  where  his  color  would  have 
elected  him  over  the  regular  candidate. 

Apparently  it  occurred  first  to  Governor  Andrew  that 
it  would  be  a  good  and  wise  thing  to  elect  Mr.  Grimes 
Chaplain  to  the  Massachusetts  Senate,  in  recognition  of 
his  eminent  service,  and  as  a  practical  illustration  of  the 
principles  of  Christian  democracy.  The  governor  was 
very  much  interested  in  the  scheme,  and  although  there 
were  several  other  candidates,  it  was  thought  the  effort 
would  be  successful.  Among  others  whom  he  enlisted 
in  the  task  was  Mr.  Haven,  whose  zeal  was  hot  as  fire. 
He  visited  senators  he  knew  to  solicit  their  votes  and 
help  ;  he  approached  others  through  persons  likely  to 
influence  them  :  he  argued,  pleaded,  entreated,  and  was 
tireless  in  labors  and  suggestions.  He  got  some  candi- 
dates to  withdraw  in  favor  of  Grimes.  He  got  news- 
papers to  speak  for  the  measure,  especially  the  religious 
ones.  He  also  drew  the  petition  to  the  Senate  which 
we  cite  in  part : 

As  the  inauguration  of  a  new  era  of  our  national  life  do  we  make 
this  petition.  We  have  been  struggling  for  many  years  to  render 
the  doctrine  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence  and  of  the  preamble 
to  our  State  Constitution  the  law  and  life  of  the  nation.  Through 
many  defeats  and  discouragements,  at  the  ballot-box  and  on  the 
field,  we  have  steadily  pressed  forward.  Our  cause  is  to-day  glori- 
ously successful.  Slavery  is  in  its  death  struggle,  and  a  pure  and 
perfect  democracy  is  moving  the  hearts  of  the  people.  One  barrier 
to  its  prevalence  yet  exists.  It  is  the  unnatural,  undemocratic,  and 
unchristian  prejudice  on  account  of  African  descent.  This  has  suf- 
ficed to  expel  them  from  all  places  of  honor  or  trust,  has  made 


The  Reformer. 


them  incajDable  of  holding  commissions  in  the  army,  or  seats  in  the 
legislature,  and  other  like  honorable  positions. 

May  Massachusetts  elevate  one  who  was  once  a  slave,  bought, 
sold,  and  lashed  like  a  beast,  and  yet  a  minister  of  Jesus  Christ,  to 
that  position  which  no  other  minister  by  virtue  of  such  experience  can 
fill  so  well.  .  .  .  The  act  will  become  historic.  Other  States  will  vie 
with  us,  and  a  pure  and  righteous  democracy  every-where  prevail. 

The  movement  failed,  to  the  equal  chagrin  of  Governor 
Andrew  and  Mr.  Haven,  failed  of  its  immediate  object, 
but  was  made  the  occasion  of  a  great  deal  of  fruitful 
discussion.  His  liking  for  Andrew  drew  Mr.  Haven  to 
his  side  when  the  governor  persistently  refused  to  sign 
the  death  warrant  of  Green,  "  the  Maiden  murderer." 
As  no  reasons  for  such  action  were  given  to  the  public, 
much  wonder  and  some  anger  arose  ;  the  reasons  were 
such  as  could  not  be  given  to  the  public.  Mr.  Clarke 
says  : 

Because  Andrew  refused  to  sign  the  death  warrant  of  a  murderer, 
he  was  accused  of  being  false  to  his  oath  of  office,  and  following  his 
anti-capital-punishment  prejudices.  There  was  great  excitement 
against  him  through  the  State  for  his  course  in  the  matter,  and  he 
gave  no  reason  publicly  for  it.  I  once  asked  him  why  he  did  not 
take  some  method  of  giving  his  reasons  and  explaining  to  the  people 
the  grounds  of  nonaction.  His  reply  was  :  "  If  I  did  this  it  would 
seem  as  though  I  were  placing  myself  in  opposition  to  the  courts, 
which  would  be  an  evil.  I  prefer  to  bear  the  misrepresentation  my- 
self.   My  back  is  broad  enough  for  that." 

Mr.  Haven  shared  the  governor's  views  on  this  case, 
and,  after  conference  with  him,  stated  that  side  of  the 
case  in  a  letter  to     The  Advertiser."    The  letter  made 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


much  talk,  and  one  person  was  so  much  interested  that 
he  ordered  three  hundred  copies  for  distribution  in  im- 
portant quarters. 

But  the  time  came  when  Andrew,  no  longer  governor, 
accepted  a  large  fee  from  the  friends  of  free  rum  for 
conducting  an  onslaught  upon  the  temperance  legislation 
of  Massachusetts  under  guise  of  an  inquiry  or  hearing 
before  the  legislative  committee  on  that  subject.  Never 
had  so  influential  and  popular  a  man  in  the  State  em- 
barked in  such  an  enterprise.  The  mischief  was  im- 
mense. Then,  sad  at  heart,  kindly  in  tone,  faithful  to 
God  and  humanity,  Mr.  Haven  rebuked  the  great  treason 
of  his  fallen  leader.  He  said  to  us  at  the  time,  ''Wait 
till  you  have  to  strike  the  man  you  most  admire  if  you 
would  know  what  it  costs  me  to  raise  my  hand  against 
him."  When  the  great  governor  died,  October  30,  1867, 
Haven's  Journal  had  this  entry: 

This  afternoon  Governor  Andrew  died.  Struck  with  paralysis 
last  night,  he  lay  insensible  till  he  expired.  Sad,  sudden,  terrible. 
Great  in  many  gifts.  I  had  the  pleasure  of  considerable  acquaint- 
ance with  him.  Had  met  him  at  his  rooms  and  house,  and  talked 
with  him  about  poor  Ed.  Green,  Mr,  Grimes,  whom  we  tried  to  make 
chaplain  of  the  Senate,  and  on  the  question  of  prohibition.  But 
for  his  course  on  this  question  his  record  would  have  been  honorable 
in  the  highest  degree.  But  for  his  course  here,  too,  there  would 
have  been  no  such  powerful  current  against  the  law  as  is  now  run- 
ning. He  died  too  late  for  a  perfect  fame.  He  was  but  young,  not 
fifty,  and  had  undoubtedly  a  high  career  before  him.  How  surely 
we.  walk  in  a  vain  show  !    A  moment  here,  and  then  gone  forever. 

We  give  this  as  an  example  of  his  relations  with  pub- 
lic men  in  Massachusetts  during  his  long  residence  there. 


The  Reformer. 


3^3 


He  had  a  very  high  appreciation  of  the  personal  charac- 
ter and  pubhc  service  of  many  persons  who  were  before 
the  world  as  public  men.  He  never  failed  to  point  out 
what  he  regarded  as  blemishes  in  their  conduct :  Mr.  Gar- 
rison for  his  merciless  diatribes  at  the  churches  and  his 
unbelief;  Senator  Sumner  for  his  agreement  in  principle 
with  Andrew  on  the  prohibition  question  ;  Mr.  Wilson 
for  his  willingness  to  put  aside  the  claims  of  temperance 
until  the  war  issues  were  finally  adjusted;  Governor 
Bullock  for  his  want  of  interest  in  any  urgent  reform  ; 
and  Governor  Claflin,  whose  high  personal  character, 
honorable  example,  and  genuine  piety  he  gladly  con- 
fessed, for  his  belief  that  the  temperance  people  could 
best  advance  their  cause  by  a  close  alliance  with  the 
Republicans  in  Massachusetts.  To  the  latter  he  ad- 
dressed, in  the  autumn  of  1870,  the  following  letter  on 
the  action  of  the  Republican  Convention,  which  had  just 
renominated  him  ; 

My  Dear  Governor  Claflin  :  You  will  excuse,  I  trust,  the 
liberty  I  take  in  addressing,  much  more  in  advising,  you.  But  I  have 
for  you  so  high  a  regard  and  respect  that  I  think  you  will  justify  my 
freedom.  I  have  read  the  resolutions  and  heard  of  the  treatment 
the  question  of  prohibition  received  at  Worcester  at  the  hands  of 
the  Convention.  Every  leading  man  in  the  body  derided  it.  Bird, 
Slack,  Robinson,  Russell,  Jewell,  all  the  managing  force  of  the  Con- 
vention rejected  it  with  contempt.  Colonel  Wright  spit  on  it,  and  the 
mass  applauded  his  insults.  The  resolution  is  after  the  pattern  set 
by  Mr.  Robinson  and  copied  by  Mr.  Slack,  namely,  that  the  Pro- 
hibition party  only  opposed  dram  shops,  and  the  Republicans  did  that ; 
a  statement  which  is  not  true  in  either  case,  as  they  well  know ;  the 

former  advocating  prohibition  by  name,  and  the  latter  not. 
14 


3'4 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


What  I  take  the  liberty  of  writing  to  you  for,  is  to  do  a  great  deed 
that  will  make  you  the  first  man  of  the  hour  and  one  of  the  first  of 
history.  It  is  to  decline  the  nomination  on  such  a  platform.  That 
platform  is  not  your  sentiments.  It  is  Governor  Andrew's,  and  no 
higher,  nor  as  high,  for  he  was  in  favor  of  more  stringent  legislation 
than  this  approves.  It  urges  no  restriction  practically  on  this  traffic. 
You  are,  I  know,  heart  and  soul  for  prohibition.  You  tried  faith- 
fully to  prevent  the  bill's  passage  which  came  before  you.  You 
yielded  a  little,  not  willingly,  but  of  seeming  necessity.  The  leaders 
of  that  Convention,  the  real  managers  of  the  party,  have  swept  away 
all  barriers  save  one,  and  that  only  they  favor  the  retention  of.  If 
you  would  now  take  the  stand  that  you  could  not  run  on  that  plat- 
form, you  would  be  the  most  popular  man  of  the  State  and  the 
nation.  You  cannot  regulate  or  save  this  cause  by  staying  as  the 
executive  head  of  the  Republican  party.  You  can  conquer  by  refus- 
ing that  post.  You  have  held  it,  honored  it,  and  honored  yourself 
in  it.  You  can  honor  yourself  more  than  ever  by  declining  it.  I 
know  how  generally  your  devoted  and  ardent  friends  share  in  my 
feelings.  I  have  seen  many  of  them,  with  tears  in  their  eyes,  protest 
against  this  action  of  their  party.  Your  name  alone  keeps  them 
silent.  Were  you  to  decline,  it  would  be  hailed  by  them  all  as  the 
proudest  day  for  you,  for  them,  for  the  Church,  and  for  the  country. 
You  would  receive  such  applause  as  you  enter  their  assemblies,  such 
an  ovation  in  Faneuil  Hall,  as  has  been  given  to  no  man  in  my  time. 
The  feeling  is  deep,  very  deep  ;  you  cannot  tell  how  deep. 

I  beg  you  to  prayerfully  consider  this  duty.  I  know  it  will  be  greatly 
blessed  of  God.  I  hope  you  will  be  persuaded  to  do  it.  I  have  not 
written  a  harsh  word  of  you  or  felt  a  harsh  feeling.  I  am  proud  of 
you,  but  I  hope  you  will  give  me  and  a  multitude  more  a  chance  to 
shout  it  out.        Very  sincerely  and  devotedly  yours, 

G.  Haven. 

This  letter  serves  to  illustrate  several  points  in  its 
author's  way  of  dealing  with  public  questions.  He  had 
persuaded  himself  that  after  the  disappearance  of  slav- 


The  Reformer.  315 

ery  and  the  political  issues  arising  from  the  close  of  the 
war  some  other  reform  would  come  to  the  front  and 
occupy  public  attention  and  favor.  He  saw  none  so 
likely  to  assume  this  position  as  the  temperance  reform. 
He  used  to  describe  the  Republican  party  in  Massachu- 
setts as  made  up  of  Rummies,  Don't  cares,  and  Prohibi- 
tionists, and  he  fancied  that  the  development  of  a  strict- 
ly temperance  party  would  draw  into  its  camp  the  best 
elements  of  the  two  regular  parties.  Governor  Claflin 
thought  that  more  could  be  done  by  a  close  alliance 
with  the  Republicans  than  in  any  other  way.  Mr.  Ha- 
ven had  spoken  against  this  policy  in  his  paper,  had  got 
resolutions  passed  against  it  at  camp-meetings  and  else- 
where, and  he  now  sought  to  commit  Governor  Claflin 
to  his  own  policy.  The  calm  and  wise  governor  was 
much  better  informed  as  to  what  was  the  actual  state  of 
public  opinion,  and  what  was  to  be  expected  from  such  a 
new  departure  than  his  adviser.  The  movement  which 
he  was  thus  invited  to  champion  was  guided  by  that 
prince  of  American  orators  and  agitators,  Wendell  Phil- 
lips. As  the  Prohibitionist  candidate  for  the  Governor's 
Chair,  Mr.  Phillips  made  an  animated  but  unsuccessful 
campaign.  Mr.  Haven  discussed  the  issues  of  the  cam- 
paign in  the  "  Herald,"  and  gave  his  aid  to  the  new  party. 
He  abstained  from  all  direct  criticism  of  the  actual  ex- 
ecutive, but  claimed  that  this  great  moral  reform  would 
never  succeed  until  it  forced  itself  upon  the  public  through 
widespread  poHtical  action.  This  course  caused  consid- 
erable discussion  and  criticism  among  his  readers,  but 
nobody  doubted  the  sincerity  of  his  conduct. 


5i6 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  XVn. 

THE    MAN    OF  LETTERS. 

Literary  Career— Defective  Training— Faults  of  Style— Writing  for  Newspapers— Pict- 
ures of  War  and  Slavery  — Dr.  Cuyler— "Life  of  Father  Taylor"  — "The  Pilgrim's 
Wallet,"  and  "  Our  Next-door  Neighbor  "  —  The  "  National  Sermons." 

nr^HE  first  thing  to  be  said  about  Gilbert  Haven  as  a 
^  literary  man  is  that  he  never  properly  was  one. 
During  his  college  days  he  had  many  doubts  concerning 
his  vocation,  but  no  dream  of  being  a  man  of  letters 
seems  to  have  laid  hold  of  him.  While  he.  was  teaching 
he  turned  his  hopes  and  longings  toward  the  law  and 
the  ministry,  but  never  toward  writing  for  the  press. 
He  was  always  eager  to  be  a  speaker  to  men. 

His  training  in  college  was  not  colored  in  any  degree 
by  aspirations  for  fame  in  letters.  Had  he  entertained 
such  plans  he  must  have  cleared  himself  of  some  of  his 
most  obvious  faults  in  style,  and  mastered  some  tech- 
nical details  of  which  his  knowledge  remained  crude  to 
the  last.  That  his  worst  defects  were  palpable  in  his 
undergraduate  period  is  evident  from  a  story  for  which 
President  Beach  is  responsible. 

A  certain  classmate  of  Mr.  Haven's,  the  poorest 
writer  in  his  class,  was  reported  destitute  of  the  requi- 
site essay,  as  the  class  was  about  to  meet  for  its  rhetor- 
ical exercises.  Mr.  Haven  promised  to  supply  the  poor 
fellow's  need  within  the  hour,  and  did  so  in  an  essay 


The  Man  of  Letters.  317 

intended  to  represent  his  fellow-student's  range  of 
thought  and  diction.  The  extemporized  essay  was 
adopted  by  the  destitute  student,  and  put  into  the 
instructor's  hands  as  his  own  production. 

At  the  next  meeting  of  the  class  with  Professor  Hol- 
dich,  that  gentleman  selected  two  essays  from  the  batch 
for  special  discussion.  One  he  declared  the  most  de- 
fective of  all  he  had  found,  and  he  went  through  its 
faults,  bad  grammar,  bad  rhetoric,  and  cheap  wit,  with 
some  severity.  *  The  other  was  pronounced  the  best  of 
all,  and  its  good  points  were  shown  up  in  clear  light. 
Haven  was  the  author  of  both. 

Some  obvious  faults  in  writing  adhered  to  Mr.  Haven 
throughout  his  entire  life.  Nobody  had  to  read  far  to 
come  upon  errors  too  palpable  to  be  defended,  and  neg- 
ligence too  gross  to  be  excused.  More  than  once  has 
he  replied  to  remonstrances  on  such  matters.  O,  I 
never  think  of  such  details.  I  get  just  as  full  as  I  can 
of  any  thing  I  wish  to  write  about,  and  just  as  hot  as  I 
can  over  it,  and  then  I  drive  away  at  it  with  all  my 
might."  He  was  so  insensible  to  some  of  the  worst 
results  of  this  method  of  writing  that  he  would  gravely 
defend  errors  and  infelicities  which  should  have  brought 
a  blush  to  the  cheeks  of  m^ich  poorer  writers  than  he. 
He  thought  it  defense  enough  of  any  sentence,  if  it 
could  be  read  so  as  to  express  his  meaning,  and  he  had 
a  huge,  though,  in  his  case,  very  unwise  contempt  for 
small  critics.  He  used  to  show  with  grim  delight  a 
newspaper  critique  of  one  of  his  books,  running  like 
this :  "  Mr.  Haven  says  the  steamer  leaves ;  now,  of 


3»8 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


course,  a  shrub  or  tree  is  the  only  thing  that  can  rightly 
be  said  to  leaveT 

There  must  have  been  something  in  his  original  make- 
up which  rendered  him  slow  to  see  things  which  are 
readily  grasped  by  much  duller  minds  than  his,  without 
being  so  severely  schooled  by  tutors  and  governors  as 
he  needed  to  be.  Says  G.  M.  Steele,  one  of  Haven's 
familiars  : 

He  was  full  of  thought  struggling  for  utterance,  and  it  was  some- 
times more  painful  to  restrain  himself  than  to  wrfte.  It  was  like  fire 
shut  up  in  his  bones.  He  drove  right  at  his  subject.  The  mere 
graces  of  rhetoric  he  could  not  stop  to  cultivate.  He  was  bound  to 
get  his  ideas  into  other  people's  minds,  and  this  he  usually  did, 
whether  in  accordance  with  the  conventional  rules  or  not,  and  it  was 
often  the  case  that  these  rules  were  recklessly  ignored.  He  had  no 
exactness  of  style  or  method. 

Evidently  one  must  be  a  writer  of  quite  uncommon 
merits  to  succeed  in  spite  of  such  drawbacks  in  style. 
Had  Mr.  Haven  ever  changed  his  plans  so  as  to  make 
literature  his  chief  business  he  would  have  made  some 
effort  to  escape  his  most  obvious  deficiencies.  He  would 
have  sought  to  gain  some  clear  insight  into  the  chief 
modern  literatures,  to  freshen  and  enlarge  his  knowl- 
edge of  the  classics,  and  to  procure  a  comprehensive 
mastery  of  the  literary  treasures  of  his  mother  tongue. 
He  never  read  Chaucer  enough  to  comprehend  his  lan- 
guage readily.  Spenser  he  found  no  time  to  grow 
familiar  with,  and  knew  him  mainly  at  second-hand. 
Shakspeare  he  had  conned  right  diligently  till  he  had 
much  of  his  verse  at  his  tongue's  end,  but  Shakspeare's 


The  Man  of  Letters.  319 

contemporaries  were  mostly  unknown  to  him.  The 
writers  of  Queen  Anne's  time  he  had  learned  to  love  in 
college,  and  they  were  long  his  favorites.  His  acquaint- 
ance with  the  Lake  School  was  later,  and  very  full  and 
detailed  was  his  study  of  some  of  them  ;  he  ranked 
Wordsworth  and  Coleridge  as  its  chiefs,  but  he  rated 
Do  Quincey,  Southey,  and  Kit  North  far  too  high. 
Burns  and  Scott  he  knew  well.  The  best  contemporary 
writers  in  Great  Britain  and  America  were  his  possession 
and  were  rated  quite  at  their  real  worth.  That  he 
added  much  to  his  literature  after  this  period  there  is 
no  reason  to  suppose.  He  read  what  came  to  hand 
from  the  publishers :  histories,  biographies,  novels, 
poems,  travels,  popular  science,  magazines,  quarterlies. 
But  he  knew  better  than  any  thing  else  the  recent  nov- 
elists and  poets.  They  were  his  favorite  reading  after 
the  Bible  and  Shakspeare. 

He  had  a  remarkable  memory,  and  things  which 
pleased  his  fancy  clung  to  it  like  musk  to  Sunday 
clothes.  He  had  read  pious  Bunyan,  and  holy  Herbert, 
and  witty  and  wise  Sir  Thomas  Browne  to  such  effect 
that  their  choicest  dainties  of  quaint  and  homely  relig- 
ious truths  were  always  at  hand  for  use,  though  after  we 
knew  him  well  he  no  longer  read  them  much. 

One  practice  he  had  which  needs  to  be  borne  in  mind 
in  judging  him,  that  of  fixing  striking  passages  of  poetry 
in  his  memory,  so  that  they  could  be  recalled  upon  any 
occasion.  He  would  keep  the  volume  containing  the 
favorite  gem  with  him,  con  it  over,  put  the  passage  into 
letters  to  friends  and  the  papers,  cite  it  in  the  ser- 


320  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

mon  he  was  preparing,  give  it  to  a  friend  on  the  cars, 
toss  it  off  in  prayer-meetings,  spout  it  in  conversation  or 
at  some  preachers'  meeting.  That  would  long  continue 
a  stock  quotation  with  him.  He  had  many  such  stores, 
so  that  people  thought  it  a  marvel  he  should  be 
able  to  remember  so  correctly  so  much  fine  poetry. 
When  they  found  him  making  accurate  quotations  from 
books  he  had  not  seen  for  months,  in  forests  miles  away 
from  a  library,  they  thought  him  more  a  wonder  than 
he  really  was. 

His  memory  was  also  very  retentive  for  the  general 
plan  of  a  novel,  its  chief  characters  and  incidents.  On 
reading  a  report  of  a  lecture  in  the  house  of  an  acquaint- 
ance, he  has  been  known  to  go  to  the  book-case  and 
take  down  the  proper  volume  of  Gibbon  and  turn  to 
the  right  chapter  to  correct  some  mistake  which  had 
caught  his  eye.  Yet  he  had  not  read  Gibbon  at  all 
later  than  his  college  days.  Such  was  the  general 
equipment  of  I\Ir.  Haven  for  literary  work  during  his 
best  years. 

Mr.  Haven  gradually  drifted  toward  literature  in  the 
journals  of  his  denomination.  He  began  writing  for 
"  Zion's  Herald,"  The  Northern  Advocate,"  The 
Christian  Advocate,"  and  the  "  Ladies'  Repository." 
He  tried  to  get  into  the  "  Methodist  Quarterly  Re- 
view," under  the  rule  of  Dr.  M'Clintock,  but  failed. 
Mr.  Haven  kept  the  rejected  article,  and  wrote  on  the 
outside,  "  Rejected  by  Rev.  Dr.  M'Clintock."  Afterward 
he  was  somewhat  elated  over  an  invitation  to  write  for 
that  journal  from  Dr.  Whedon,  after  the  latter  had 


The  Man  of  Letters.  321 

heard  Mr.  Haven  speak  at  Middletown  on  some  public 
occasion. 

His  earliest  letters  to  the  newspapers  were  bright, 
scrappy,  and  full  of  the  newest  novelties,  civil  and 
ecclesiastical.  They  were  witty  and  bold  ;  and  they 
sometimes  talked  about  the  new  books  of  the  time,  not 
without  felicitous  critical  touches.  There  was  no  ap- 
pearance of  serious  literary  ambition  until  about  the 
time  of  his  first  visit  to  Europe.  His  articles  in  the 
**  Quarterly  "  were  such  as  any  busy  and  bright  minister 
might  throw  off  in  haste.  While  a  chaplain  in  the  army 
he  saw  a  chance  to  paint  some  carefully  wrought  pict- 
ures of  slavery  in  its  expiring  condition.  He  sent 
some  of  these  to  the  ^'  Atlantic  Monthly,"  which  did 
not  print  them  ;  and  some  he  sent  to  Harper's 
Monthly,"  which  did  print  them  after  purging  them  of 
some  fine  writing."  Mr.  Haven  was  only  too  glad  to 
procure  their  publication  at  the  expense  of  the  "  fine 
writing,"  though  it  cost  him  a  sigh  and  a  smile  to  ob- 
serve that  the  purgation  of  the  "fine  writing"  took 
away  the  ultra  antislavery  passages,  and  a  compliment 
to  camp-meetings. 

These  successes  turned  his  mind  to  the  chance  of 
making  something  more  out  of  European  travel  than 
is  commonly  done,  and  he  followed  the  matter  up  with 
great  promptitude  and  success.  Some  of  these  sketches 
were  sent  to  the  Independent,"  to  see  whether  they 
would  not  open  the  columns  of  that  journal  to  him. 
This  was  the  beginning  of  a  coimection  with  that  pow- 
erful and  brilliant  newspaper  which  continued  till  the 
14* 


322  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

close  of  his  life.  One  of  these  papers  was  an  account 
of  the  meetings  of  the  General  Assemblies  of  the  Es- 
tablished and  Free  Churches  of  Scotland.  It  was  in  his 
best  vein  and  made  a  very  favorable  impression.  Hor- 
ace Greeley  is  said  to  have  pronounced  it  a  remarkable 
production,  and  to  have  asked  somewhat  carefully  about 
the  writer. 

Mr.  Haven  heard  of  this  success  under  somewhat  pe- 
culiar circumstances.  Somewhere  in  Switzerland,  after 
a  hard  day's  climbing  and  sight-seeing,  an  acquaintance 
introduced  him  at  an  inn  to  Rev.  Dr.  Cuyler,  of  Brook- 
lyn.   Mr.  Cuyler  started  at  the  name,  and  demanded, 

"  Are  you  the  Gilbert  Haven  who  has  been  publishing 
a  series  of  articles  in  the  '  Independent  ?  '  " 

I  am  the  very  fellow,"  said  the  lively  pilgrim. 

"  Let  me  congratulate  you  on  their  success.  They 
have  made  a  great  impression,"  said  the  Brooklyn  di- 
vine. 

This  was  good  news  to  the  traveler,  for  he  had  not 
seen  or  heard  any  thing  from  his  ventures  in  the  paper 
up  to  that  moment.  That  evening  the  two  American 
clergymen  held  a  prayer-meeting  at  their  hotel  to  pray 
especially  for  the  overthrow  of  the  slave-holders'  rebel- 
lion. Their  hearts  warmed  to  each  other,  and  Dr.  Cuy- 
ler, years  afterward,  laid  his  wreath  of  affection  in  "  The 
Independent  "  on  Mr.  Haven's  coffin. 

Besides  his  editorial  labors  and  his  articles  in  the 
**  Methodist  Quarterly  Review,"  Mr.  Haven  published 
during  his  life-time  four  volumes:  ''The  Pilgrim's  Wal- 
let," "  Father  Taylor,  the  Sailor  Preacher,"  National 


The  Man  of  Letters.  323 

Sermons,"  and  Mexico,  Our  Next-Door  Neighbor." 
The  first  and  the  last  of  these  volumes  grew  out  of  let- 
ters home  while  he  was  abroad  on  his  various  pilgrim- 
ages. The  account  of  the  Sailor  Preacher  he  wrote  at 
the  instance  of  a  bookseller,  and  with  the  hearty  good- 
will and  aid  of  Father  Taylor's  family.  It  is  a  genuine 
rough  classic,  an  aqua-fortis  etching  of  one  of  the  most 
genuine  men  and  peculiar  geniuses  who  has  lived  in  our 
time.  Mr.  Haven  had  known  Father  Taylor  from  his 
own  boyhood,  and  had  been  blessed  with  some  of  his 
heartiest  benedictions  and  maledictions  touched  off  with 
his  undecaying  wit.  The  Sailor  Preacher  had  so  long  been 
one  of  the  celebrities  of  Boston  that  he  was  known  to  mul- 
titudes of  people.  Almost  every  body  had  some  won- 
derful story  to  narrate  of  his  doings  and  sayings.  Trav- 
elers put  portraitures  of  him  and  his  preaching  into 
their  accounts  of  Boston.  A  multitude  of  Mr.  Taylor's 
associates  in  various  organizations  were  found  in  and 
about  Boston.  But  as  Mr.  Taylor  never  wrote  a  ser- 
mon, prayer,  speech,  or  lecture,  rarely  even  a  letter,  and 
had  dictated  no  memoranda  of  his  life  and  fortunes,  it 
was  clear  that  his  life  must  be  written  at  once  if  at  all, 
and  the  sooner  the  better. 

The  publisher  fortunately  applied  to  Mr.  Haven  to 
undertake  this  difficult  task.  The  latter  knew  the  man 
so  well,  sympathized  with  his  work  so  entirely,  appre- 
ciated his  wit  and  humor  so  admirably,  that  on  these 
grounds  alone  he  would  have  been  the  natural  biog- 
rapher of  th|  evangelist  of  the  Seamen's  Bethel.  But 
Mr.  Haven  knew  personally  nearly  every  body  whom  it 


324 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


was  needful  to  consult  in  order  to  find  all  possible  ma. 
terials  for  his  work.  He  had  a  cordial  way  of  seeking 
aid  of  those  who  could  help  him,  which  made  them  lav- 
ish their  stores  of  information,  and  feel  sorry  they  had 
so  little  to  bestow.  He  had  every  body's  ear  and  every 
body's  heart  at  command.  As  the  solution  of  quick- 
silver draws  to  itself  from  the  pulverized  rock  all  its 
particles  of  precious  gold,  so  did  this  biographer  bring 
together  from  all  their  hiding  places  the  scattered  feat- 
ures of  Father  Taylor's  portrait  into  a  living  image. 
Partly  because  he  was  so  swift  and  deft  in  this  employ- 
ment, the  book  was  done  in  eight  short  and  busy 
months.  Had  the  biography  fallen  into  the  wrong, 
hands  no  such  gem  would  exist  to-day,  and  had  it 
come  into  the  skillfulest  hands  a  few  years  later  no 
such  abundant  materials  could  have  been  found. 

The  first  and  the  last  of  Mr.  Haven's  books  crrew  di- 
rectly  out  of  his  travels  in  Europe  and  Mexico,  and  are 
quite  similar  in  their  structure  or  growth.  The  main 
difference  in  their  interest  lies  in  the  difference  between 
Europe  and  Mexico.  In  Europe  are  the  grandest  nations 
of  the  world,  with  ages  of  splendid  existence  behind  them. 
England,  France,  Germany,  Switzerland,  Italy,  Greece  : 
what  avenues  into  the  history  of  the  past  do  these 
names  open  !  what  splendid  literatures  do  they  call  up  ! 
and  what  illustrious  names  in  the  past  and  present  in 
all  departments  of  learning,  action,  and  achievement ! 
In  Mexico  was  a  novel  country,  filled  with  strangely 
beautiful  scenery,  whose  story  was  known  ^o  him  almost 
solely  in  the  calm  and  stately  history  of  Prescott.  It 


The  Man  of  Letters.  325 

had  for  him  no  Hterature,  no  great  lines  of  historical 
persons  and  places,  no  men  of  world-wide  renown  in 
letters  or  war.  He  found  there  a  people  of  a  strange 
tongue,  the  Romish  Church,  with  its  superstitions  and 
institutions,  and  a  few  foreigners  with  whom  he  could 
exchange  ideas.  Of  course,  such  as  the  country  gave 
him  he  put  into  the  book.  He  was  as  bright,  saga- 
cious, and  interesting  as  ever;  but,  though  very  inter- 
esting for  its  novelty  and  scenery,  the  Mexican  land 
was  comparatively  unfruitful.  This  kind  of  writing 
suited  him  ;  he  had  great  pleasure  in  sitting  down,  after 
a  long  and  busy  day  of  travel  on  foot  or  by  carriage,  at 
his  inn,  to  write  out  the  story  of  his  day's  travel  and 
sight-seeing.  He  would  write  for  several  hours  on  the 
keen  jump,  and  send  off  his  scribblings  to  some  news- 
paper to  be  printed  without  revision  or  correction. 

It  is  a  marvel  that  he  could  write  so  well  as  he  did 
under  the  circumstances  ;  and  he  often  makes  the  cir- 
cumstances still  worse  by  writing  at  depots,  on  his  knee, 
in  stage  coaches,  on  the  cars,  and  even  in  bed.  It  fol- 
lows that  the  subjects  he  deals  with  are  such  as  can  be 
touched  off  lightly,  or  are  too  plain  to  be  missed,  or 
such  as  his  previous  studies  have  furnished  him  for 
handling.  Even  when  at  home,  surrounded  by  books 
and  as  much  at  leisure  as  he  could  be,  he  was  always 
rather  impatient  of  the  drudgery  of  thorough  prepara- 
tion for  sermons,  editorials,  and  review  articles.  His 
articles  on  Wordsworth,  John  Ruskin,  and  Inspiration 
reveal  this  trait.  The  last  reveals  it  very  badly,  despite 
the  reading  and  sagacity  it  shows,  by  the  superficial 


326  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

way  in  which  it  deals  with  the  objections  it  tries  to 
overcome,  and  the  total  failure  to  see  the  questions 
raised  by  Comparative  Philology  concerning  the  ultra 
views  put  forth  on  that  side.  Instead  of  the  slow,  pa- 
tient, comprehensive  collation  of  all  the  facts  and  ele- 
ments of  the  question,  a  deliberate  estimate  of  the  light 
thrown  upon  the  subject  by  the  statements  of  holy 
Scripture,  and  an  ever-present  caution  against  either 
pressing  his  points  too  far  or  failing  to  press  them  far 
enough,  and  a  solemn  purpose  to  hold  for  truth  only 
what  has  God's  warrant  in  revelation  or  science,  he  was 
wont  to  deal  in  the  rashest  assertion.    He  says: 

If  the  ^ook  of  God,  then,  is  the  Book  of  God,  it  must  be  person- 
ally, directly,  exclusively  his  book,  his  idea,  and  his  expression;  his 
in  its  minutest  word,  his  in  its  perfect  totality.  .  .  .  That  verbal  in- 
spiration is  the  only  inspiration  possible  is  proven  from  the  laws  of 
philolog-y.  ...  If  God  gives  any  inspiration  it  must  be  in  words. 
He  cannot  give  the  thought  without  giving  it  its  appropriate  lan- 
guage. 

This  is  given  only  as  an  illustration  of  a  certain  arro- 
gance of  assertion,  which  was  perhaps  the  worst  intel- 
lectual fault  of  Gilbert  Haven.  He  knew  nothing  about 
the  laws  of  philology  save  a  little  notion  caught  up  for 
the  occasion.  This  defect  grew  more  marked  as  he 
grew  older,  and  sometimes  provoked  rude  rebuke  from 
men  whose  learning  and  patience  far  transcended  his, 
and  who  had  a  conscience  as  quick  to  scientific  duty  as 
his  was  to  social  duty. 

Speaking  solely  from  a  literary  point  of  view,  the  best 
of  Mr.  Haven's  books  is  "  National  Sermons."  The 


The  Man  of  Letters.  327 

volume  is  made  up  of  sermons  on  subjects  of  national 
interest,  written  at  intervals  from  the  passage  of  the 
Nebraska  Bill,  in  1850,  down  to  the  election  of  General 
Grant  to  the  Presidency  of  the  United  States  in  1868. 
There  is  no  prominent  event  in  the  long  history  of  the 
successive  advances  of  the  hosts  of  freedom  against  the 
battalions  of  slavery  that  is  not  discussed  with  the 
greatest  fullness  and  sagacity.  If  in  any  later  speech 
or  sermon  he  soared  to  a  loftier  strain  than  he  reaches 
here,  it  is  either  when  he  touches  the  same  themes,  as 
in  his  discourse  on  the  Chisholm  massacre,  or  when  he 
handles,  in  an  inspired  hour,  some  great  religious  theme 
with  which  he  is  quite  familiar.  It  was  remarked  in  the 
early  years  of  his  ministry,  that  his  sermons  on  political 
subjects  were  of  much  higher  type  than  his  usual  preach- 
ing, and  the  ordinary  explanation  was  that  he  gave 
more  time  to  study  in  preparing  them.  But  his  letters 
and  Journals  do  not  show  this  to  have  been  the  case. 
These  discourses  were  commonly  written  in  one  day, 
and  sometimes  at  one  sitting,  and  it  was  not  by  his 
choice  or  wisdom  that  they  were  so  superior. 

Mr.  Haven  had  been  gradually  prepared  to  write 
these  sermons  from  his  boyhood.  His  early  conversion 
to  Abolitionism  had  made  him  a  reader  of  the  books 
and  newspapers  devoted  to  the  interests  of  the  slave. 
In  this  way  he  had  become  very  familiar  with  the  argu- 
ments for  the  antislavery  side,  the  objections  raised 
against  those  views,  and  the  safest  way  of  answering 
them,  and  all  the  readiest  ways  of  stirring  up  the  public 
conscience.    He  was  familiar  with  the  views  of  all  the 


328  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

great  lawyers  and  statesmen  of  the  land  concerning  the 
legal,  historical,  and  constitutional  questions  involved  ; 
he  knew  the  early  hostility  of  Southern  statesmen  and 
patriots  to  human  bondage  ;  the  sad  story  of  the  en- 
croachments and  extensions  of  the  slave  power,  and  the 
shameless  tale  of  Northern  truckling  and  subserviency 
to  its  arrogant  demands  ;  and  he  had  witnessed  many 
of  the  worst  steps  of  national  wrong-doing,  with  an  in- 
dignation which  rendered  his  recollection  of  them  keen 
and  instant.  He  had  debated  all  phases  of  the  subject 
over  and  over  with  school  and  college  companions,  with 
Northern  defenders  of  the  gigantic  iniquity,  and  with 
slave-holders  themselves,  until  nothing  new  could  be 
said  on  any  side.  He  had  assailed  the  system  with 
the  weapons  of  his  wit,  sarcasm,  and  scorn.  He  had 
read  the  Bible  against  slavery,  prayed  against  it,  laughed 
at  it,  and  prophesied  against  it.  Hence  he  knew  the 
entire  subject  by  heart. 

This  vital  preparation  to  discuss  at  once,  without 
further  special  study,  any  aspect  of  the  general  subject 
gave  free  play  to  Mr.  Haven's  best  faculties.  He  al- 
ways was  fervid  with  all  natural  and  Christian  feeling 
whenever  he  spoke  on  this  theme,  and  now  he  could 
glow  and  blaze  away  to  his  heart's  content.  Under  the 
high  strain  of  these  intense  feelings  his  wit  and  humor, 
his  imagination  and  his  memory,  alike  contribute  their 
best  help  to  the  illumination  of  his  pages  ;  and  even 
the  style  is  so  elevated  as  to  lose  its  worst  faults.  It 
becomes  correct  in  grammar  and  rhetoric  ;  it  becomes 
tense  and  vital  in  movement  ;  and  it  flashes  with  bright- 


The  Man  of  Letters. 


329 


ness  and  beauty.  The  sermons  should  be  read  in  their 
completeness  in  order  to  reveal  the  full  appropriateness 
of  what  we  assert,  and  to  show  that  what  we  give  are 
really  fair  samples.  He  opened  a  fast-day  sermon  be- 
fore the  New  England  Conference  in  April,  1863,  with 
these  words  : 

The  feast  referred  to  by  the  apostle  was  the  Jewish  fast  and  feast, 
commemorative  alike  of  the  greatest  gloom  and  gladness.  It  is  cele- 
brated to-night  and  to-morrow  all  over  Christendom,  by  both  Jews 
and  Christians — the  solemn  sacrifice,  typical  and  memorial,  of  the 
blessed  Lord.  With  Paul  we  see  the  sacred  supper  and  the  more  sa- 
cred garden  that  eternally  sanctify  this  day.  With  him  we  behold 
the  consummations  of  the  morrow,  from  the  midnight  betrayal  to  the 
midnight  burial,  the  scorn  and  scourging,  the  mob,  from  publican  to 
priest,  seething  with  ferocious  rage,  the  cross  of  agony,  the  torn  and 
bloody  hands  and  feet  and  head,  the  blackened  heavens  and  rent  earth! 
How  they  overwhelm  us  as  we  stand  on  this  distant  point  of  earth  and 
time,  and  look  upon  that  form,  high  and  lifted  up !  The  preliminary 
services  of  many  generations  also  rise  before  us,  even  back  to  that 
Thursday  night  when  there  was  wrought  out  the  earthly  salvation 
of  a  nation,  type  of  the  earthly  and  eternal  salvation  of  the  world. 
We  see  the  poor  slaves,  aroused  by  the  screams  of  their  hitherto 
haughty  neighbors,  hastily  cooking  their  unraised  cakes,  and,  in 
great  terror,  as  well  as  in  great  joy,  fleeing  from  the  house  of  bond- 
age. The  light  of  four  thousand  years  shines  solemnly  upon  us. 
We  feel  our  unity  with  the  emancipated  founders  of  the  memorial 
sacrifice,  with  Him  in  whom,  "  in  the  form  of  a  slave,"  it  was  divine- 
ly consummated. 

A  year  later,  with  Grant  moving  toward  Richmond, 
Pastor  Haven  opened  a  sermon  in  this  language : 

The  land  trembles  with  the  conflict  that  has  been  raging  for  more 
than  a  week  in  the  seat  of  the  Rebellion.    The  smoke  ol  the  great 


330 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


agony  curls  up  in  the  central  heavens,  and  casts  its  lurid  darkness 
over  our  visible  skies.  Under  its  sulphurous  canopy  our  sons  and 
brothers  have  been  wrestling  in  a  death  struggle  with  those  who 
should  be  our  sons  and  brothers,  for  principles  and  privileges  that 
are  dearer  than  life.  We  gather  in  this  quiet  house  of  prayer,  far  from 
the  scene  of  the  contest,  yet  we  hear  but  little  save  the  rapid  pelting 
of  the  musketry  or  the  fearful  boom  of  the  artillery.  Our  ears  are 
filled  with  the  hurrahs  of  our  boys  as  they  fly  up  the  steep  sides  of 
rebel  earthworks,  or  the  Indian  yells  of  our  foes,  as  they  leap  in 
mighty  masses  upon  our  serried  columns.  The  piled  dead  lie  before 
our  vision,  ghastly,  torn,  trampled,  their  eyes  glazed,  or  staring  in 
muddy  impurity.  The  wounded,  sinking,  fainting,  groaning,  bleed- 
ing, fill  our  souls  with  inexpressible  anguish.  We  see  not  each 
other's  faces,  we  hear  not  each  other's  voices.  These  sights  and 
sounds  fill  sense  and  soul  to  a  staggering  fullness. 

In  further  illustration  of  the  opulence  of  his  effective 
introductions,  take  the  opening  sentences  of The  Crisis 
Hour." 

Three  years  of  war !  The  three  months  which  we  were  told  at 
the  beginning,  by  the  most  influential  man  in  the  nation,  were  to 
see  its  completion,  have  stretched  painfully  into  years.  Again  and 
again,  and  yet  again,  have  our  harvests  of  brave  men  been  swept 
down  by  the  reaper  Death.  Myriads  of  souls  of  heroes  have  de- 
scended untimely  to  Hades,  and  still  the  bloody  sickle  is  thrust  in, 
and  still  the  bloody  harvest  is  gathered. 

To  see  the  lavish  wealth  of  these  beginnings  of  ser- 
mons, one  should  peruse  those  which  preface  The 
World  War,"  The  Vial  Poured  Out,"  "  The  Death  of 
Abraham  Lincoln,"  and  "America's  Past  and  Future." 
We  can  only  cite  further  the  opening  sentences  of  The 
End  Near :  " 


The  Man  of  Letters. 


331 


After  a  long,  long  night  of  clouds  and  darkness  and  storm,  thun- 
derings  and  lightnings,  and  tempests  of  blood,  with  faint  gleamings 
of  the  muffled  stars  at  times,  to  show  us  that  the  heavens  still  abide, 
yet  with  no  grayness  even  betokening  the  actual  dawn,  suddenly  we 
see  the  "  King  of  day  rejoicing  in  the  East."  The  shadows  flee,  the 
golden  glory  covers  the  horizon,  and  shoots  its  radiance  across  the 
whole  heavens.  Even  the  blindest  bats  of  night,  that  beat  their 
leathery  wings  and  eyeless  heads  against  the  walls  of  the  national 
temple,  confess  that  something  bright  and  beautiful  is  stealing  over 
their  feeble  senses.  They  know  not  what  it  means  oris,  for  they  have 
torn  out  their  eyes  with  their  own  claws.  They  feel  a  warmth,  a 
sunniness,  pervading  their  spirits  that  compels  their  unwiUing  recog- 
nition of  the  coming  day.  But  the  people  see  the  light,  and  rejoice 
in  it,  and  hasten  to  the  brightness  of  its  rising. 

The  same  splendor  and  force  of  language  and  the 
like  brilliancy  of  imagination  shine  in  all  these  dis- 
courses. They  all,  but  especially  those  near  the  close 
of  the  volume,  are  remarkable  for  fullness  of  matter, 
naturalness  of  arrangement,  simplicity  of  design,  and  for 
a  grand  steadiness  of  sweeping  and  cumulative  move- 
ment. They  have  the  even  push  of  the  gulf  stream,  and 
the  grandeur  of  whirlwinds.  They  leap,  with  volcanic 
force,  from  Nature's  heart.  If  one  must  choose,  let  him 
study  The  Vial  Poured  Out,"  or  America's  Past  and 
Future."  The  intense  feeling  which  glows  throughout 
the  entire  volume  exalts  Mr.  Haven  above  his  ordinary 
range,  and  lifts  him  out  of  his  worst  faults  in  style.  If 
there  is  a  pun  in  these  pages,  it  has  escaped  atten- 
tion. Even  his  wit  flashes  less  frequently  than  usual 
here,  but  it  has  a  keener  edge  than  ever  for  the  mean- 
ness bred  in  the  nation  by  slavery. 


332  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


A  friend  of  mine,  a  New  York  lawyer,  had  a  fine  Africo-European 
superintending  his  farm.  The  morning  after  the  call  for  the  first 
seventy-five  thousand  volunteers,  the  young  man  informed  him  that 
he  could  work  for  him  no  longer. 

"  Why  not.?  " 

"  I  am  going  to  war." 

"  But  you  can't  go." 

"  Why  not?  " 

He  was  ashamed  to  answer  the  glowing  patriot,  but  he  had  to. 
"  You  are  black," 

The  poor  fellow  stood  paralyzed,  as  if  a  bullet  had  pierced  his 
heart.  He  had  forgotten  all  about  his  brown  complexion.  His 
heart  was  red  with  the  hottest  of  patriot  blood.  The  call  made 
no  reference  to  white  men.  How  was  he  excluded?  He  shrunk 
back  to  his  enforced  shame. 

Then  he  shows  that  the  Church  is  no  better  than 
the  State  : 

We  must  expunge  the  word  "colored"  from  our  Minutes.  It 
ought  never  to  have  found  a  place  there.  How  abominable  that 
epithet  appears  in  the  eyes  of  the  Saviour,  by  whom  these,  his  lireth- 
ren,  were  cleansed  with  the  same  blood,  and  perchance  at  the  same 
moment  and  at  the  same  altar.  He  does  not  write  it  in  the  Lamb's 
book  of  life,  the  heavenly  Minutes  of  his  Church.  .  .  .  And  yet  we 
shamefully  degrade  them.  How  unchristian  and  inhuman  such 
conduct  is  may  be  seen  from  a  single  example.  Suppose  an  unfor- 
tunate dwarf  should  join  this  Church,  and  the  pastor  should  return 
three  hundred  full-grown  adults  and  one  dwarf,  or  if  a  dozen  mutes 
or  blind  should  become  members,  and  we  should  make  the  like  dis- 
tinction, how  quickly  should  we  revolt  from  the  revelation  in  our- 
selves of  the  old  leaven  of  malice  and  wickedness  !  What  a  torrent 
of  indignation  would  be  poured  out  on  our  Missionary  Board  if  they 
should  publish  in  their  East  Indian  returns  their  Brahmin  and 
Pariah  members  in  separate  columns.    But  the  worst  feature  of  this 


The  Man  of  Letters. 


333 


iniquity  is  that  it  casts  reproach  on  those  who,  by  the  pressure  of  an 
ungodly  world,  are  already  oppressed.  The  Gospel  is  especially 
tender  toward  the  lowly  and  despised.  We  are  especially  cruel.  It 
also  inevitably  breeds  in  us  hardness  of  heart,  the  extreme  opposite 
of  the  new  heart,  whose  law  is  to  esteem  others  better  than  our- 
selves. 

I  was  struck  with  this  years  ago  in  a  revival  that  occurred  in  a 
country  town  in  the  State  of  New  York.  The  preacher,  a  godly 
brother,  though  not  educated  in  this  truth  above  the  community  in 
which  he  lived,  was  inviting  sinners  to  the  altar.  Seeing  some  of 
his  congregation  urging  the  few  of  this  color  present  to  go  forward, 
the  thought  dimly  struck  him  that  they  were  included  in  "  all  the 
world  "  whom  they  were  singing  about  as  being  invited  by  Christ. 
So  he  said  at  the  close  of  his  invitation,  "  If  there  are  any  colored 
persons  present  who  have  souls  let  them  come  forward  also."  To 
such  a  request  no  colored  person  who  had  a  soul  would  be  apt  to 
respond.  The  same  brother,  in  summing  up  the  fruits  of  the  re- 
vival, announced  to  the  Church  that  so  many  had  been  converted, 
"and  John,  Jane,  and  Dinah,  colored  persons."  He  was  uncon- 
sciously but  correctly  conforming  to  the  custom  of  our  Church. 

These  citations  show  some  of  Mr.  Haven's  best  quali- 
ties as  a  writer.  Had  he  been  as  faithful  in  his  warfare 
against  literary  faults  as  he  was  against  social  vices  and 
religious  wrong-doing  he  would  have  ranked  easily  among 
the  foremost  preachers  and  writers  of  his  generation. 


334 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  XVni. 


THE  EDITOR. 


Editor  of  "  Zion's  Herald  " — His  Policy  and  Aims — Editorial  Work — New  Writers  for 
the  "Herald" — The  Change — Work  of  the  Religious  Editor— Veuillot's  Statement— Skill 
in  Editorial  Comment — Notices  of  Books — Reforms,  Popular  and  Unpopular — War  on 
Rationalism  and  Unitarianism — The  Return  Fire — General  Result — Pet  Themes — Jour- 
nalistic Device— A  Lively  Paper — Illustrations  of  his  Wit — "Brilliant  but  Useless" — 
"All  Head" — "Experience  Telling" — "Poor  Laird  " — An  Invitation  Declined — His 
Criticism  of  Secular  Journals— Lay  Representation— Politics— "  Herald  "  Criticised,  but 
Successful— Call  to  the  "  Boston  Traveller,"  and  "  The  Independent." 


R.  HAVEN'S  health  had  now  so  far  improved 


^  that  ''The  Wesleyan  Association,"  on  March  ii, 
1867,  unanimously  elected  him  editor  of  "Zion's  Her- 
ald," the  organ  of  New  England  Methodism.  In  con- 
nection with  this  subject  the  Journal  says: 

The  ministers  are  cordial  and  quite  anxious  I  should  take  it.  I 
have  accepted,  though  my  head  warns  me  that  it  is  dangerous.  I 
have  done  no  steady  and  responsible  work  since  November,  1865, 
almost  a  year  and  a  half.  It  seems  questionable  whether  I  can 
again  wear  the  yoke  ;  and  such  a  yoke.  The  "Association  "  is  very 
generous,  and  will  do  every  thing  in  their  power  to  relieve  me. 
They  give  me  $2,500  for  salary,  and  $3,000  for  office  and  outside 
work.  They  have  never  before  given  over  $1,000  for  the  latter.  Dr. 
Cobleigh  was  sick,  and  could  not  carry  it  on.  My  health  may  com- 
pel me  to  give  it  up  at  an  early  day.  But  I  hope  by  the  strength 
given  me  of  God  to  do  the  Church  some  service  in  this  line.  The 
journals  are  very  complimentary,  and  thus  make  the  work  still 
harder.  I  little  thought  I  ever  should  read  in  the  public  prints  such 
words  about  myself  as  I  find  there.    It  is  something  akin  to  fame,  if 


The  Editor. 


335 


not  the  article  itself.  Yet  I  feel  unworthy,  deficient,  and  limited  in 
capacity.  I  have  tried  to.  do  my  duty  as  well  as  I  cQuld.  I  have 
spoken  the  word  as  it  was  spoken  to  me,  as  I  felt,  by  the  Spirit  of 
God.  I  have  tried  feebly  but  faithfully  to  do  my  duty.  ...  My  great 
grief  is  that  these  favors  cannot  be  shared  by  her  w-hose  love  more 
than  all  else,  save  the  grace  of  Christ,  has  stimulated  and  sustained 
me. 

I  shall  enter  on  my  duties,  with  God's  help,  April  lo.  I  hope  I 
may  meet  in  some  slight  degree  the  wishes  of  my  friends  and  the 
responsibilities  that  weigh  so  heavily  on  that  post.  To  preach  to 
fifty  thousand  people,  what  a  responsibility  !  May  God  help  me  to 
declare  his  whole  counsel  and  fulfill  the  ministry  which  I  have  re- 
ceived of  the  Lord  Jesus  !  The  time  is  short.  Twenty  years  more 
and  I  am  an  old  man,  if  alive,  which  is  not  very  likely. 

Despite  the  very  grave  sense  of  weakness  and  de- 
pendence which  breathes  through  these  words,  the  sole 
obstacle  to  success  much  dreaded  by  the  new  editor  was 
his  ill-health.  He  had  already  tested  his  power  and 
popularity  as  a  writer  in  so  many  journals  that  he  had 
good  reason  to  think  they  would  not  fail  him  in  Zion's 
Herald."  If  there  was  any  part  of  the  world  which  he 
knew  all  through  it  was  New  England  ;  and  if  he  knew 
any  fraction  of  New  England  better  than  the  rest,  it  was 
the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  Here,  too,  he  was 
better  known  and  liked  than  in  any  other  part  of  the 
land  or  Church.  He  had  an  ambition  to  do  something 
to  raise  the  standard  of  journalism  in  his  own  Church, 
in  addition  to  all  his  other  objects  of  eager  pursuit. 

Mr.  Haven  came  to  the  editorial  chair  of  "  Zion's 
Herald "  when  a  decided  change  in  its  management 
was  imperatively  demanded.    It  had  been  directed  in 


336 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


succession  by  excellent  editors.  W.  C.  Brown,  Abel 
Stevens,  Daniel  Wise,  E.  O.  Haven,  and  Nelson  E.  Cob- 
leigh  were  men  of  real  ability  in  their  work ;  but  they 
had  been  hampered  by  the  poverty  of  the  resources  at 
their  command.  With  very  little  aid  they  had  carried 
all  the  responsibilities  of  the  work.  The  previous  editor 
had  given  up  his  work  because  his  health  had  really 
broken  down  under  so  many  cares,  and  he  had  urgently 
demanded  that  his  successor  should  have  an  office- 
editor  to  share  and  diminish  his  multiplied  duties. 
This  was  needed  not  only  because  the  general  advance 
in  journalism  made  such  a  change  in  the  editorial  work 
indispensable,  but  yet  more  on  account  of  changes  the 
new  editor  proposed  to  make  in  the  general  running  of 
the  paper.  He  found  an  able  and  agreeable  assistant- 
editor  in  Mr.  C.  Henry  St.  John,  with  whom  his  rela- 
tions were  always  the  very  best.  Of  course,  we  cannot 
follow  Mr.  Haven  through  the  five  volumes  of  the 
Herald  "  he  edited  ;  let  us  notice  some  of  the  im- 
provements he  brought  into  the  paper,  and  some  of  his 
editorial  characteristics. 

One  very  marked  change  which  he  introduced  was 
the  higher  style  of  editorial  work  which  the  "  Herald  " 
now  showed.  His  swift  pen  supplied  most  of  the  edi- 
torials, though  others  were  allowed  and  invited  to  use 
those  columns  at  their  own  discretion  for  the  weal  of 
the  Church.  Topics  which  lay  outside  the  editor's  beat 
were  treated  by  some  of  the  best  informed  and  brightest 
writers  for  the  press,  as  C.  C.  Hazewell,  Warrington," 
James  Redpath,  and  Judge  Bond.    Then  the  good  writ- 


The  Editor. 


337 


ers  of  the  denomination  itself  were  drawn  upon  as  never 
before.  Bishop  Thomson,  Drs.  Stevens,  Wise,  M'CUn- 
tock,  W.  F.  Warren,  H.  W.  Warren,  Newhall,  D.  Steele, 
G.  M.  Steele,  and  B.  K.  Pierce  were  enlisted.  Among 
the  younger  writers  who  were  brought  in  were  W.  F. 
Mallalieu,  L.  T.  Townsend,  W.  N.  Rice,  J.  O.  Knowles, 
and  George  Prentice. 

Mr.  Haven's  catholic  temper  led  to  the  appearance  of 
many  new  names  in  the  "  Herald  "  from  other  denomi- 
nations, as,  Drs.  Cuyler,  Nehemiah  Adams,  F.  D.  Hunt- 
incrdon,  and  H.  N.  Powers.  Even  the  columns  in- 
tended  for  the  less  conspicuous  matters  with  which  a 
newspaper  has  to  deal  were  edited  with  great  taste  and 
skill. 

One  has  only  to  compare  the  volumes  of  the  "  Her- 
ald "  issued  under  Mr.  Haven's  care  with  those  pub- 
lished before  his  time  to  see  that  he  elevated  his  paper 
at  once  to  a  high  position  among  the  best  religious  news- 
papers of  the  period.  The  new  writers  dealt  with  a 
great  variety  of  topics,  and  handled  them  with  breadth, 
learning,  vivacit}',  and  fidelity  to  the  wants  of  the  land 
and  the  times.  With  the  funds  at  his  disposal  his  pre- 
decessors might  have  raised  the  rank  of  the.  paper,  but 
candor  compels  a  doubt  whether  any  of  them  could 
have  done  as  much  for  it  as  he.  He  had  much  more 
than  any  person  known  to  us  the  gifts  which  go  to 
make  up  a  successful  religious  journalist.  Such  a  jour- 
nalist must  discuss  the  events  that  occupy  the  public 
mind,  and  these  are  very  manifold.    To-day  he  must 

speak  of  fires,  railway  disasters,  and  marine  calamities ; 
15 


338  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

and  to-morrow  the  whirlwind,  a  flood,  or  the  plague 
asks  attention  ;  now  it  is  a  mania  in  speculation,  a  polit- 
ical convention,  and  a  camp-meeting  he  has  on  hand ; 
then  it  is  the  death  of  some  eminent  person,  the  luxury 
of  weddings  or  funerals,  and  some  great  scientific  dis- 
covery that  he  must  discourse  of;  sometimes  it  is  the 
corruption  of  public  life,  the  derelictions  of  a  profession, 
and  the  frauds  of  trade  that  he  has  forced  on  his  atten- 
tion ;  and  sometimes  it  is  the  lapse  of  a  minister  into 
public  sin,  the  scenes  of  divorce  courts,  and  the  de- 
bauchery of  free  love  which  he  must  castigate.  The 
journalist  must  watch  that  kaleidoscopic  succession  of 
things  which  we  call  public  affairs,  and  be  prepared  to 
explain,  praise,  blame,  moralize,  and  turn  to  general 
edification  whatever  comes  uppermost. 

The  religious  journalist  must  be  ready  to  utter  the 
judgment  of  the  Christian  conscience  upon  such  events, 
to  interpret  their  bearing  on  public  morals  and  religious 
interests,  and  to  turn  public  opinion  in  favor  of  Chris- 
tian ideas. 

Monsieur  Louis  Veuillot,  himself  one  of  the  great 
lights  of  the  Parisian  and  Catholic  editorial  world,  who 
had  great  personal  acquaintance  with  the  business,  and 
a  yet  larger  range  of  observation,  has  given  his  notions 
of  the  demands  of  such  work  in  words  worth  quoting : 

The  journalist's  gift  is  promptness,  dash,  and  especially  transpa- 
rency. He  has  only  a  sheet  of  paper,  and  only  an  hour  for  explain- 
ing the  issue,  beating  his  adversary,  and  giving  his  views  ;  if  he  says 
a  word  which  does  not  go  straight  to  the  mark,  if  he  pronounces  a 
phrase  which  the  reader  does  not  instantly  comprehend,  he  does 


The  Editor.  339 

not  know  his  business.  Let  him  hurry  up,  let  him  be  clear,  let  him 
be  simple.  The  pen  of  a  journalist  has  all  the  liberties  of  daring 
conversation  ;  let  him  employ  them.  But  no  machinery,  and  let  him 
fight  shy  of  eloquence.  At  the  utmost,  let  him  salute  it  for  a  mo- 
ment only  on  his  way. 

The  two  points,  among  those  insisted  on  by  Veuillot, 
wherein  Mr.  Haven  sometimes  came  short,  were  perspi- 
cuity and  eloquence.  His  editorials  were  pretty  certain 
to  use  all  the  freedom  with  language  and  grammatical 
construction  which  the  boldest  conversation  should  al- 
low itself;  and  sometimes  it  was  even  worse  than  this. 
But  one  must  remember  his  habit  of  writing  anywhere 
and  every-where  in  judging  such  lapses  into  rhetorical 
and  grammatical  sin.  The  religious  weekly  newspaper 
tolerates,  and  is  even  better  for,  some  measure  of  elo- 
quence on  religious  and  spiritual  themes  ;  and  this  tol- 
eration was  never,  or  rarely,  carried  too  far  in  Mr. 
Haven's  days  at  the  Herald  "  office.  Take  him  all  in 
all,  Mr.  Haven  was  much  nearer  Veuillot's  standard 
than  most  other  good  editors  of  his  time. 

There  have  been  few  men  in  our  day  connected  with 
the  Christian  press  who  have  been  better  furnished  for 
this  rapid,  changing,  and  multiplex  task  than  he.  He 
had  a  journalistic  habit  of  mind  from  his  youth  up.  He 
read  many  papers  all  his  life,  he  talked  about  their  ways 
of  serving  the  public,  he  used  to  say  that  the  book,  the 
quarterly,  the  monthly  would  all  die  out,  and  the  news- 
paper only  would  remain  in  the  future.  He  had  gained 
the  habit  of  rapidly  observing  the  current  of  the  world, 
he  knew  how  to  append  his  messages  of  truth,  warning, 


340  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

admonition,  or  alarm  to  whatever  was  running,  and  he 
liked  the  rapid  hand-to-hand  encounters  of  the  journals. 
That  sort  of  rapid  action  suited  him. 

More  than  any  other  religious  editor  known  to  us, 
he  used  his  paper  for  pulpit  work  in  the  strict  sense  of 
the  term.  Turn  to  almost  any  number  of  the  Herald," 
under  his  editorship,  and  you  find  a  very  telling  bit  of 
address  to  the  souls  of  tempted  men.  These  editorials 
usually  address  only  one  class  at  a  tiipe,  and  that  in 
clear,  plain,  swift,  and  tender  words.  They  are  so  short 
that  they  can  be  read  in  a  couple  of  minutes,  and  so 
vital  and  direct  that  they  go  home  at  a  flash  to  the 
reader's  heart.  Mr.  Haven  spent  a  great  deal  of  time 
on  these  little  and  hearty  articles.  Yet  they  were  not 
all  his  own.  Sometimes  Dr.  Mallalieu  tried  his  hand, 
and  sometimes  Dr.  J.  O.  Knowles.  One  day  an 
editor  congratulated  him  on  one  of  them  as  being  "  a 
gem  of  the  highest  water.  Haven  at  his  best  in  his  high- 
est line."      O,  well,"  said  the  victim  of  the  compliment, 

Haven  at  his  best  is  nothing  but  Jim  Knowles,  then  ; 
for  that  gem  was  written  by  Rev.  J.  O.  Knowles,  of 
Chelsea."  He  always  liked  to  tell  the  story  where  it  was 
needed. 

But  apart  from  these  brief  sermons  and  exhortations 
the  editorial  page  frequently  contained  articles  of  a 
similar  nature,  but  more  elaborate,  and  effective  at  long 
range.  It  is  a  great  thing  to  be  able  to  handle  these 
subjects  in  such  a  broad,  free  way,  with  such  noble  sim- 
plicity and  force,  that  the  chance  reader  shall  find  his 
attention  gained  and  held,  even  despite  a  little  impa- 


The  Editor.  341 

tience  over  such  appeals  to  emotion  and  conscience. 
This  was  done  in  such  a  fresh  and  natural  manner,  in 
the  tone  of  a  man  communing  with  his  fellows,  of  quick 
and  stirring  appeal,  that  it  seemed  less  like  preaching 
than  roadside  talk. 

This  quality  showed  to  great  advantage  in  connection 
with  his  discussions  of  the  bearing  of  accidents  and 
disasters  on  the  divine  Providence  that  finds  its  own 
blessed  path  through  storm  and  earthquake.  One  of 
the  actual  perils  of  such  topics  is  the  assumption  that 
we  know  all  about  them,  can  see  and  show  others  their 
roots  in  the  evils  of  the  times  and  the  sins  of  bad  men, 
and  declare  how  they  might  be  avoided.  Some  religious 
editors  are  so  oppressed  with  the  difficulty  of  a  calm, 
wise,  and  enlightened  exposition  of  such  subjects  that 
they  ignore  them  entirely,  or  discuss  them  in  a  timidly 
helpless  way.  Mr.  Haven  was  very  happy  in  the  treat- 
ment of  such  themes.  A'certain  natural  relicfious  tact 
withdrew  him  from  too  frequent  meddling  with  these 
topics,  and  helped  him  to  the  wisely  bold  assertion  that 
all  such  events  are  related  to  moral  as  well  as  physical 
antecedents.  He  knew  how  to  speak  the  Christian 
word  on  such  occasions  without  either  too  much  insist- 
ence or  any  timidity.  He  had  a  lightness  and  a  firm- 
ness of  tread  which  rendered  this  perilous  ground  safe 
and  easy  footing,  and  he  knew  all  the  turns  by  which 
a  skillful  transition  is  effected  from  debatable  territory 
to  the  regions  of  universal  and  confessedly  Christian 
verities. 

One  point  on  which  Mr.  Haven  rated  his  skill  highly 


342  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

was  noticing  books.  There  are  swarms  of  books  flood- 
ing all  newspaper  offices  whose  wisest  treatment  is  to 
notice  them  as  little  as  possible,  an  art  in  which  Haven 
was  adroit.  He  was  very  felicitous  in  notices  of  works 
of  poetry  and  fiction,  and  books  of  travel.  His  wide 
reading  in  these  kindred  realms  of  literature  furnished 
him  amply  with  the  resources  for  natural  comparison 
and  parallels  ;  his  broad  glance  swept  the  new  book  into  a 
long  line  of  its  kindred  works,  and  gave  it  its  true  place, 
and  his  gift  of  appreciation  was  helpful,  even  where  his 
criticism  was  severe.  How  he  would  set  forth  in  loving 
fullness  the  beauties  of  a  new  poem  from  any  of  his  great 
favorites,  Browning,  Tennyson,  Longfellow,  Holmes, 
Whittier,  Lowell,  or  a  translation  of  Homer,  Dante,  Vir- 
gil, Faust,  or  Aristophanes  !  They  seemed  to  be  personal 
friends  for  whose  entertainment  and  honor  enough  could 
not  be  done.  Of  course,  he  sometimes  slipped  in  his  es- 
timate of  poetic  novelties.  Thus  he  surmised  that  Mor- 
ris was  Chaucer  come  back  again,  and  he  said  that  Bick- 
ersteth's  forgotten  poem  would  yet  rank  alongside  Mil- 
ton's Paradise  Lost."  If  challenged  for  such  slips,  he 
would  usually  defend  them,  summarize  the  book  or  poem 
for  admiration,  and  then  exaggerate  his  originally  mis- 
taken decision.  In  such  cases  the  theories  or  stories  of 
which  the  poems  were  the  vehicles  had  beguiled  his  lit- 
erary conscience. 

His  own  books  of  travel  made  his  judgment  of  the 
merits  of  such  books  very  safe  and  appreciative.  He 
had  liked  such  works  from  his  childhood,  and  so  spoke 
of  them  from  a  wide  knowledge  of  the  field.    He  used 


The  Editor.  343 

to  lament  his  inability  to  properly  review  historical 
works  of  great  scope  and  importance.  Here  his  remarks 
were  always  those  of  a  sagacious  and  swift-sighted 
reader,  and  never  of  a  peer  and  master.  All  these  great 
works  of  human  skill,  patience,  learning,  and  wisdom  had 
a  perennial  interest  for  his  active  mind. 

Within  the  scientific  and  religious  realms  he  had 
sharply  defined  and  powerfully  held  opinions,  which  he 
put  forward  on  every  natural  occasion.  On  some  points 
he  seemed  narrow  and  intolerant  to  many,  but  his  own 
judgment  was  that  on  these  points  truth  itself  is  narrow 
and  intolerant.  This  is  a  line  which  can  only  be  wisely 
drawn  by  a  man  of  broad  intelligence,  faithful  con- 
science, and  charitable  heart.  The  two  last  he  always 
had,  even  in  a  high  degree,  but  he  sometimes  seemed 
too  hurried  or  too  impatient  to  reach  the  first  in  the 
eyes  of  some  of  his  best  friends. 

It  is  needless  to  say  that  a  diligent  watchfulness  over 
the  welfare  of  religion  and  morals  presided  over  these 
reviews  of  literature.  Any  thing  likely  to  pervert  the 
public  conscience  or  lower  the  moral  tone  of  society  he 
branded  with  unflinching  courage  and  severity.  No 
other  gifts,  however  lofty,  could  persuade  him  to  silence 
or  gentle  speech  on  such  points.  He  drew  from  current 
literature  whatever  honest  aid  he  could  for  all  the  relig- 
ious and  social  reforms  on  which  his  heart  was  set. 

It  is  not  easy  to  make  out  how  far  ]\Ir.  Haven's 
incessant  discussions  of  caste,  co-education,  women's 
rights,  prohibition,  and  skepticism  were  parts  of  delib- 
erate plans  carried  into  steady  execution,  and  how  much 


344  l^iVE  OF  Gilbert  Haven. 

they  sprang  without  care  from  the  peculiarities  of  his 
situation.  It  is  safe  to  say  that  he  did  not  deem 
himself  bound  to  a  decorous  and  prudential  silence  here 
by  his  official  position.  He  went  into  the  editorial  chair 
consecrated  and  ordained  to  utter  all  the  great  convic- 
tions of  his  soul  as  to  the  vices  and  sins,  duties  and 
needs  of  the  Church  and  Nation.  Many  of  these  were 
entirely  clear  to  his  mind  from  the  outset,  but  perhaps 
a  retrospective  view  gives  us  the  idea  of  more  system- 
atic planning  and  far-reaching  deliberation  in  certain 
parts  of  this  editorial  work  than  there  was  in  it. 

Mr.  Haven  may  be  credited,  reasonably  enough,  with 
the  fixed  intention  of  drawing  sharply  the  real  lines  of 
separation  between  the  orthodox  and  heterodox  elements 
in  the  country.  In  New  England  any  thing  was  ortho- 
dox in  his  view  which  held  to  the  doctrinal  views  of  the 
great  historical  religious  parties  of  the  country.  Any 
thing  was  sound  which  professed  adhesion  to  Christ  as 
the  head  of  his  Church  ;  any  thing  was  unsound  which 
rejected  him.  He  might  have  a  thousand  quarrels 
and  differences  on  minor  points  of  dogma  and  morals 
and  ecclesiastical  order,  with  the  different  organizations 
who  yield  entire  allegiance  to  the  common  Saviour,  and 
avow  the  Holy  Scriptures  as  the  revelation  of  God's 
v/ill  to  the  world.  But  many  and  serious  as  these 
divergences  in  doctrine  and  discipline  might  be,  Mr. 
Haven  deemed  the  confession  of  faith  in  the  divine  au- 
thority of  the  word  of  God  tlie  sufficient  provision  for  all 
indispensable  unity  in  the  Church.  Heterodox  meant 
the  rejector  of  the  supernatural  revelation  of  the  divine 


The  Editor.  345 

will  in  the  sacred  word.  He  held  that  any  orthodox 
believer  needed  only  to  be  faithful  to  the  truth  and 
erace  taus^ht  in  the  Church  of  his  fathers  in  order  to 
gain  a  Christian  character ;  whereas  a  rationalist  could 
have  no  adequate  foundation  whereon  to  erect  such  a  sup- 
erstructure of  character.  This  did  not  keep  him  from 
thinking  some  skeptics  so  much  better  than  their  prin- 
ciples that  Christian  charity  might  hopefully  count  them 
the  children  of  God.  Hence  he  treated  the  Unitarians 
in  general  as  unbelievers,  though  he  was  always  ready 
to  name  individuals  among  them  as  showing  true  and 
saintly  character;  but  the  most  radical  among  them, 
those  who  made  Christianity  a  purely  human  growth 
and  creation,  he  utterly  cast  out.  Universalists  were  more 
orthodox  in  his  view,  because  in  general  they  confessed 
faith  in  the  Scriptures  as  the  supreme  and  bindmg  norm 
of  religious  doctrine.  He  in  theory  disliked  the  Calvin- 
ists,  who  seemed  to  him  to  make  God  the  sole  responsi- 
ble author  of  sin  in  the  universe,  more  than  the  Uni- 
versalists, who  stoutly  denied  that  so  good  a  God  as  the 
Bible  reveals  could  doom  the  bad  to  endless  penal  fires, 
but  practically  his  affection  took  the  opposite  way,  be- 
cause he  held  the  former  more  religious  and  righteous  in 
their  life. 

Holding  these  general  views  of  the  relations  of  the 
various  Churches  to  the  work  of  Christ  in  the  world,  it 
is  evident  that  he  would  have  a  plain  course  in  relation 
to  many  movements.  He  had  not  long  been  seated  in 
his  editor's  chair  before  he  began  to  make  an  impression 
on  the  general  public.    The  representatives  of  advanced 


34^  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

Unitarianism  in  those  days  were  more  numerous  and 
more  active  than  now.  One  way  or  another  he  had  to  deal 
with  Revs.  James  Freeman  Clarke,  W.  R.  Alger,  J.  Weiss, 
D.  A.  Wasson,  O.  B.  Frothingham,  Hepworth,  Higgin- 
son,  Towne,  and  Samuel  Johnson.  They  were  all  very 
hard  at  work  making  way  for  a  new  Evangel  by  stoutly 
whacking  away  at  every  piece  of  bigotry  they  could  lay 
their  hands  on  among  the  Evangelicals,  or  crov/ding 
Jesus  of  Nazareth  down  into  the  company  of  Confucius, 
Buddha,  Zoroaster,  and  Mohammed.  It  is  noticeable 
that  no  pains  were  spared  to  laud  these  confessed  men, 
and  no  chance  was  overlooked  for  hinting  and  affirming 
that  Jesus  is  merely  a  man  like  the  others.  Soon  after 
Mr.  Haven  took  the  "  Herald  "  in  charge,  Mr.  Alger 
opened  a  service  in  Music  Hall,  of  the  most  elaborate 
character  in  its  make-up  and  settings.  The  wonderful 
organ,  a  large  and  effective  choir,  elaborate  musical  per- 
formances, and  the  preaching  were  combined  to  attract 
a  great  multitude  to  that  beautiful  auditorium.  The 
music  alone  cost  yearly  from  $7,000  to  $10,000,  and 
other  things  in  like  ratio. 

This  was  the  most  determined  effort  ever  made  on 
the  side  of  that  religious  party  to  regain  the  hold  on 
the  public  through  Music  Hall,  which  had  slipped  away 
from  them  when  Theodore  Parker  died.  Mr.  Haven 
knew  that  the  music  was  only  a  bait  to  render  the  new 
theology  more  acceptable,  and  that  many  were  attracted 
by  the  music  who  had  no  real  liking  for  the  doctrines 
held  and  taught  there.  Mr.  Haven  noticed  the  move- 
ment, regretted  the  vogue  it  would  give  to  a  clergyman 


The  Editor.  347 

who  was  an  avowed  unbeliever  in  the  special  doctrines 
of  Christianity,  who  denied  the  certainty  of  a  future 
life,  and  who  "  put  Christ  and  Buddha  together,  with 
Buddha  a  little  ahead." 

This  article  was  quoted  by  the  Boston  organ  of  the 
Unitarians,  the  "  Christian  Register,"  with  comments  of 
the  most  vigorous  character.  The  gentle  Gilbert  must 
have  thought  of  Napoleon's  epigram,  Scratch  a  Rus- 
sian and  you  wake  up  a  Cossack,"  as  the  Unitarian 
benediction  befell  him.  He  was  taxed  with  intolerance, 
bigotry,  cowardice,  skulking,  falsehood,  meanness,  and 
being a  moral  pachyderm."  This  refined  form  of  the 
apostolical  benediction  seemed  hardly  to  ruffle  the  new 
editor.  He  had  no  difficulty  in  proving  that  Mr.  Alger, 
on  his  own  showing,  and  that  of  the  Register,"  was  all 
that  had  been  affirmed  ;  an  unbeliever  in  the  specifically 
Christian  dogmas,  had  no  faith  in  immortality,  and  did 
often  seem  to  put  Buddha  before  Jesus.  Then  the 
storm  broke,  and  raged  for  a  long  time.  Some  friends 
of  the  new  movement  denied  rashly  that  the  affirmations 
of  the  Herald  "  could  be  maintained,  and  claimed  the 
Christian  character  for  the  ministry  of  such  men  as 
Alger,  Towne,  Weiss,  Samuel  Johnson,  and  O.  B. 
Frothingham.  Of  course,  Renan  and  Baur  are  Chris- 
tians if  these  are  ;  and  to  attach  such  a  meaning  to  the 
word  would  be  misleading,  and  therefore  mischievous, 
even  in  the  theologically  wide-awake  atmosphere  of 
Boston  ;  and  Mr.  Haven  was  quite  right  in  refusing  to 
have  a  hand  in  any  such  mystification.  We  cannot  fol- 
low the  controversy  through  all  its  phases  and  ramifi- 


348  Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 

cations  to  the  end.  It  may  suffice  to  say  that  Mr.  Ha- 
ven forced  the  confession  from  high  Unitarian  authority 
that  there  was  an  advance  party  among  them,  who  made 
Christianity  merely  one  of  the  manifold  forms  in  which 
the  religious  faculties  of  humanity  have  developed  their 
creative  energies.  Such  a  theory  of  the  true  faith 
would  shut  off  any  exclusively  divine  quality  from  the 
Christian  system  and  its  founder,  and  destroy  its  claim 
to  absolute  and  universal  acceptance.  The  most  notice- 
able result  was  perhaps  seen  in  the  Methodist  camp, 
where  coquetting  with  liberal  "  views  and  men  became 
less  common,  and  the  conviction  was  more  firmly  estab- 
lished that  fundamental  truth  should  not  be  surrendered 
even  when  the  demand  is  made  in  the  sacred  name  of 
fraternal  charity. 

The  questions  of  caste  and  prohibition,  of  co-educa- 
tion and  the  work  of  the  Church  in  the  South  were 
themes  of  perpetually  fresh  discussion.  Haven  had 
great  skill  in  giving  variety  to  such  topics,  and  used 
every  honest  art  to  serve  these  causes  to  which  he  was 
always  devoted.  Perhaps  a  sugge.stion  might  be  justly 
made  that  he  sometimes  allowed  such  special  interests 
too  large  a  share  of  his  paper.  Whether  conscious  of 
the  fact  or  not,  he  had  got  himself  into  such  a  frame  of 
mind  in  regard  to  certain  measures  and  certain  persons, 
that  it  was  easy  for  him  to  pour  out  a  torrent  of  matter, 
hot  and  hot,  or  cool  and  lofty,  on  these  matters  and 
men,  as  his  moods  or  needs  required.  And  the  business 
was  further  complicated  by  the  fact  that  papers  like  the 
Boston   "  Transcript,"   the   "  Springfield  Republican," 


The  Editor.  349 

and  the  New  York  Tribune  "  frequently  took  excep- 
tion to  the  reHgious  or  ecclesiastical  remarks  of  the 

Herald,"  notwithstanding  a  general  liking  for  the  pa- 
per for  its  utterances  on  public  questions.  The  weeks 
were  few  when  something  of  this  sort  did  not  demand 
examination,  explanation,  retort,  or  reaffirmation. 

Any  body  who  watches  the  ways  of  the  newspaper 
world  has  noticed  that  nearly  every  great  journal  has  a 
set  of  dreadful  examples  of  some  wrong  or  sin  which  it 
employs  to  occupy  the  reader's  attention  at  times  when 
there  is  nothing  else  astir,  and  a  vacancy  of  interest  is 
threatened  in  actual  events.  Some  fine  day  nothing  has 
been  done  of  any  note  by  the  kings  of  politics,  the  mag- 
nates of  Wall  Street,  the  ministers  of  the  Church,  or  the 
princes  of  the  literary  world,  the  thieves,  and  the  mur- 
derers. The  foreign  news  is  calm  as  a  sleeping  mill- 
pond  ;  no  king,  kaiser,  pope,  or  revolutionist  having  any 
graver  business  on  hand  than  sleep  or  fishing.  At 
such  barren  seasons  the  daily  papers  fall  back  upon 
their  pet  lists  of  terrible  examples,  varied  by  prayers 
for  rain  to  break  the  drought  of  novelties  in  the  news 
market. 

Mr.  Haven  had  abundant  resources  of  this  sort  always 
on  hand,  and  in  good  condition  for  immediate  use. 
Usually  he  had  no  need  to  avail  himself  of  such  artifi- 
cial resources ;  for  in  most  cases  the  news  kept  him 
more  than  busy.  He  was  once  told  that  his  "  Herald  " 
was  like  a  certain  extempore  preacher,  who,  when  he 
found  hard  work  in  getting  any  thing  interesting  out  of 
a  text  he  had  snatched  up  for  sudden  discussion,  used 


350  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

to  allude  to  the  "  Pope  of  Rome,"  and  fill  out  the 
hour  by  berating  him,  and  whose  last  resource  would 
have  been  missing  if  the  papacy  had  been  abolished. 
*'Yes,"  said  he,  "  if  Alger,  the  'Register,'  the  'Spring- 
field Republican,'  and  the  *  New  York  Tribune,'  should 
take  to  prayer-meetings  and  the  true  faith,  I  should 
have  to  sell  out  half  my  stock  in  trade  on  a  declining 
market." 

One  result  of  this  way  of  doing  things  was  that 
"  Zion's  Herald,"  under  Mr.  Haven's  management,  was 
one  of  the  liveliest  papers  in  the  country.  It  always 
had  the  courage  of  its  opinions,  and  sometimes  startled 
the  timid  by  the  consistency  with  which  it  maintained 
them.  Some  of  the  secular  papers  were  somewhat 
shocked  because  a  pious  lady,  seeing  General  B.  F. 
Butler  at  a  camp-meeting,  spoke  to  him,  and  invited 
him  forward  for  prayers ;  but  Mr.  Haven  only  said,  he 
admired  her  courage  in  obeying  her  convictions  of 
duty. 

Another  charm  of  the  paper  was  the  current  of  wit 
which  flowed  steadily  through  its  columns.  Of  course, 
most  of  this  was  not  original  with  him,  but  was  gath- 
ered from  all  kinds  of  sources.  He  had  a  ready  sympa- 
thy for  neat  things  of  this  sort,  and  when  he  encount- 
ered them  in  his  reading  they  clung  to  his  memory  so 
as  to  be  handy  for  use.  His  friends  knew  his  liking  for 
such  good  things,  and  many  of  them  were  uneasy  with 
such  an  article  on  hand  until  they  had  tested  its  effi- 
ciency on  Haven.  He  picked  such  hits  out  of  speeches 
and  after-dinner  talk,  and  helped  them  farther  on  their 


The  Editor. 


351 


way.  It  pleased  him  all  the  better  if  he  could  make 
them  point  a  moral  in  the  service  of  some  truth.  We 
select  one  or  two  examples  : 

Two  stories  were  told  at  the  Unitarians'  Festival  that  are  not  so 
bad.  A  layman,  speaking  of  ministers'  salaries,  related  this  inci- 
dent : 

"  They  tell  a  story  of  an  old  minister  on  the  Old  Colony,  who 
once  had  a  case  in  court,  and  lost  his  case.  He  surprised  all  his 
parish  the  next  Sunday  by  announcing  as  his  text,  'Hang  all  the 
law.'  (Laughter.)  Now  it  seems  to  me,  my  friends  of  the  clergy, 
that  when  you  come  to  the  end  of  the  year,  and  you  try  to  balance 
accounts,  you  might  add  a  little  to  that  text,  and  say,  '  Hang  all  the 
law  and  the  profits.'  " 

Another  layman  got  off  this  good  hit,  as  the  audience  seemed  to 
think  it ;  but  it  hits  back  a  good  deal  harder  : 

"I  want  to  tell  you  a  story  which  I  heard  at  the  first  Unitarian 
Conference  held  in  New  York,  two  or  three  years  since.  One  of  Dr. 
Bellows'  laymen  was  called  on  for  a  speech.  He  said  he  could  not 
make  a  speech,  but  that  he  would  tell  what  an  orthodox  brother  of 
his  had  told  him,  within  a  short  time,  of  a  dream  he  had  dreamed. 
He  said  that  this  orthodox  brother  dreamed  that  he  died  and  went 
to  heaven ;  and  he  said  that  as  he  went  into  the  great  city  of  Jerusalem, 
and  approached  the  throne,  there  were  a  great  many  seats  imme- 
diately about  the  throne  filled  with  persons,  and  he  asked  the  great 
God  who  these  were,  and  he  said  these  were  all  persons  who  had 
been  members  of  evangelical  Churches  on  earth.  But  he  looked 
away  off  at  a  distance  and  saw  a  great  many  black  specks  ;  and 
God  said  to  him,  'Those  are  persons  who,  when  on  the  earth,  were 
Unitarians  ;  now  they  are  here  I  can  trust  them  to  go  anywhere 
they  please  ;  their  lives  were  such  that  I  can  trust  them  to  go  whei- 
ever  they  please,  but  I  am  obliged  to  keep  these  others  in  my  im- 
mediate sight.' "  (Laughter.) 

The  souls  who  dwell  in  the  light  of  the  countenance  of  God  are 
full  as  well  off  as  the  souls  that  float  in  the  blackness,  even  if  these 


352 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


seem  to  have  a  little  extra  liberty.  This  story  tells  much  better  for 
our  side.    It  is  a  good  verification  of  Charles  Wesley's  vision  : 

"  They  sit  around  thy  gracious  throne, 
And  dwell  where  Jesus  is." 

We  hope  all  our  friends  will  accept  the  Lord  Jesus  as  their  Saviour, 
and  escape  becoming  wandering  stars,  to  whom  is  reserved  the 
blackness  of  darkness  forever. 

When  it  was  suggested  that  he  had  missed  the  best 
way  of  turning  this  story  against  the  Unitarians,  since 
he  might  have  asked  what  sort  of  people  they  were 
whose  first  and  constant  use  of  permission  "  to  go 
wherever  they  please  "  was  to  get  as  far  away  from  God 
as  they  decently  could  ?  he  answered,  "  Yes,  I  thought 
of  that  when  it  was  too  late.  Jokes  are  like  small  beer, 
Avhen  you  get  a  bottle  started  you  have  got  to  get  it 
down  any  how,  no  matter  how  much  finer  a  bottle  the 
waiter  may  offer  while  your  own  goes  fizz,  fizz  !  " 

As  he  liked  the  true  Christian  reverence  for  Mary,  the 
mother  of  our  Saviour,  he  printed  stories  like  this: 

A  Protestant  said  to  a  Catholic, 

"  The  Virgin  Mary  was  just  a  good  woman,  like  your  mother  and 
mine." 

"May  be,"  said  the  Catholic,  "but  you  must  admit  that  there's  a 
mighty  difference  in  the  children." 

The  Boston  "  Transcript  "  undertook  to  make  Mr. 
Haven's  condemnation  of  secular  education  look  absurd 
by  asking : 

Is  the  connection  any  closer  between  a  creed  and 
academic  groves  than  between  a  creed  and  a  counting- 
room  ?"  and  provoked  this  retort  : 


The  Editor. 


It  would  be  well  if  there  were  a  little  more  connection  than  there 
usually  is  between  the  true  creed  and  the  counting-room.  "  I  believe 
in  mammon  and  myself,"  is  its  usual  creed.  Will  the  "  Transcript  " 
tell  us  if  it  be  possible  to  separate  a  creed  and  a  college?  Has  not 
every  academic  grove  its  altar,  some  of  idolatry  and  some  of  true" 
worship  ? 

The  same  paper  got  this  retort  on  certain  other 
points  : 

The  "  Transcript  "  replied  to  the  question  of  the  "  Tribune  "  which 
we  quoted  last  week,  "  Whether  people  should  be  licensed  by  the 
State  to  disseminate  a  virus?  "  by  asking  another  question: 

"  In  lunatic  asylums  there  are  some  cases  of  insanity  caused  by 
religious  excitement.  Would  '  Zion's  Herald  '  favor  a  law  forbid- 
ding revivals  and  camp-meetings  ?  " 

If  the  testimony  of  the  officers  of  prisons  and  almshouses  and 
charitable  institutions  showed  that  three  fourths  of  the  crime  and 
poverty  of  the  land  were  due  to  revivals  and  camp-meetings,  we 
should  urge  their  legal  prohibition.  Will  the  "  Transcript  "  agree  to 
submit  the  drinking  of  intoxicating  drinks  to  that  test  ? 

Having  to  announce  one  week  that  a  certain  Baptist 
clergyman  had  become  a  Methodist,  he  welcomed  the 
coming  guest  in  suitable  style  ;  and  then,  the  unstable 
fellow  having  returned  to  his  first  love  within  the  week, 
he  sped  tlie  parting  guest  v\-ith  the  statement  that,  after 
all,  he  was  an  aquatic  animal,  "  and  had  only  come  to 
the  surface  long  enough  to  blow." 

He  was  well  pleased  when  he  could  get  in  a  neat  re- 
joinder on  denominational  boasting.  A  certain  Baptist 
minister  at  a  Baptist  festival  in  Tremont  Temple,  in 
some  rather  poorish  verses,  sung  the  praises  of  that 
Church  as  follows  : 


354  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


"  The  Baptists,  peculiar,  unlike  all  the  rest. 
How  is  it  they  go  toward  the  land  of  the  blest? 
You'll  see,  looking  into  the  Word  as  you  ought  to, 
His  heaviest  freight  the  Lord  sendeth  by  water." 

Whereupon  the  "  Herald  "  comments  : 

We  are  reminded  of  the  story  of  a  German  who,  having  accumu- 
lated a  pretty  fortune  by  selling  milk,  well-watered,  determined  to 
return  to  his  Faderland,  and  there  enjoy  his  success.  On  the  way 
across  the  Atlantic  a  pet  monkey  on  board  the  ship  stole  his  bag  of 
money  from  the  German's  bunk,  and  having  retreated  with  it  to  the 
mast-head,  began  an  examination  of  its  contents.  Taking  a  coin 
from  the  bag,  he  bit  it,  held  it  up  to  the  light,  and  then  dropped  it  on 
deck.  Taking  another,  he  examined  that,  and  tossed  it  overboard. 
Thus  he  emptied  the  bag,  dropping  first  one  coin  on  deck,  and  then 
throwing  another  into  the  sea.  Our  German  stood  below,  with  star- 
ing eyes  and  hair  on  end,  until  the  last  dollar  fell,  and  then  cried 
cut,  "  He  mus'  pe  der  tuyfel.  Vhat  comed  from  der  cow  he  gifs  to 
me,  vhat  comed  from  der  water  he  gifs  to  der  water.' " 

He  was  very  fond  of  turning  their  sophistical  argu- 
ments against  the  Baptists,  as  in  the  following  hit : 

Dr.  Ide,  of  Springfield,  narrates  in  the  "  Watchman  "  his  baptism 
of  a  negro  coachman,  who  hesitated  about  fulfilling  this  duty,  but 
was  brought  to  see  it  by  his  pastor's  asking  him,  what  he  did  with 
his  horses  before  putting  them  to  work  ?  I  allers  waters  dem  the 
fust  ting."  So  the  doctor  told  him,  "  If  a  man  wants  to  pull  well  in 
Christ's  chariot,  he  must  always  be  watered  at  the  start."  Where- 
upon he  says  : 

"  At  the  close  of  the  service  I  baptized  him  ;  and  soon  as  his 
round  head  and  black  wool  were  out  of  the  water,  he  fairly  blew  the 
spray  from  his  mouth,  and  with  eyes  fairly  snapping  with  joy,  and 
his  dark  face  all  aglow  with  heaven's  own  sunshine,  he  said  to  me, 
'  De  bosses  am  watered  ;'  and  went  on  his  way  a  giant  refreshed." 


The  Editor.  355 

Only  one  question,  good  doctor,  and  "  Watchman."  Do  they 
water  the  horses  by  driving  them  in  all  over,  or  only  putting  the 
water  and  the  lips  together  ? 

He  suggested  the  same  lesson  for  the  Baptists  in  the 
form  of  a  story  from  a  negro  preacher  about  his  way  of 
meeting  the  argument  : 

Dese  Baptists  tell  us  that  ter  and  inter  in  de  passages  about  being 
baptized  mean  under.  Now,  I  goes  up  to  Brudder  Jones'  house  and 
knocks  on  de  door,  and  he  werry  perlitely  says,  "  Come  in."  Now, 
when  Brudder  Jones  says.  Come  in,  do  you  'spose  I  should  be  fool 
'nuf  to  go  under  de  house  ?    Is  dat  de  way  to  come  in  ? 

He  kept  a  sharp  eye  on  the  doings  of  the  Protestant 
Episcopal  Church.  On  one  occasion  he  invited  them  all 
to  come  over  to  the  fold  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church,  the  original  Episcopal  Church  of  America,  upon 
whose  jurisdiction  all  later  episcopal  organizations'  were 
intruders.  An  Episcopal  newspaper  replied  that,  to 
judge  by  some  specimens  who  had  come  from  that 
body,  they  had  not  been  very  well  fed."  Turning  the 
apostolic  hint,  "  They  went  out  from  us,  but  they  were 
not  of  us,  if  they  had  been  of  us  they  would  no  doubt 
have  continued  with  us,"  upon  his  taunter,  he  cries. 

Like  seeks  like  ;  never  judge  a  camp  by  the  men  who 
desert  it." 

A  Boston  clergyman  is  said  to  be  responsible  for  the 
following : 

"  Why  is  milk  like  dancing  ?  "  "  Because  it  strength- 
ens the  calves." 

Like  all  editors,  he  sometimes  found  himself  hope- 
lessly snared  by  his  own  oversights  in  regard  to  some 


35^^  OF  Gilbert  Haven. 

details  of  his  paper.  His  editorials  always  urged  the 
prohibition  of  the  sale  of  cider  as  well  as  rum  and  whis- 
ky for  drinking  purposes;  but  one  week  the  gentleman 
who  furnished  the  agricultural  matter  gave  something 
about  improved  ways  of  cider-making.  Of  course,  the 
Philistines  had  the  shorn  Samson  at  their  mercy,  and 
poor  Samson  had  to  explain  how  he  was  caught  nap- 
ping in  the  very  arms  of  Delilah. 

A  venerable  minister  sent  to  the  "  Herald  "  for  pub- 
lication a  famous  cure  for  some  one  of  the  ills  that  flesh 
is  heir  to.  It  was  sent  to  the  printer  without  previous 
examination,  and  an  editorial  note  commended  it  to  the 
readers  of  the  "  Herald  "  as  well  attested  by  excellent 
people  who  had  tried  its  power.  When  the  mischief 
was  all  nicely  done  some  vigilant  eye  noted  that  the 
patient  was  directed  to  take  a  formidable  amount  of 
cider-brandy  in  so  short  a  time  that  he  would  be  infal- 
libly drunk  before  the  cure  could  do  its  perfect  work. 
The  editor  took  it  all  back  the  next  week  with  touching 
humility. 

We  give  a  sample  of  his  frequent  short  sermons  to 
ministers : 

BRILLLAXT  BUT  USELESS. 

On  visiting  Paris  Sir  Aslley  Cooper  was  asked  by  the  head  surgeon 
of  the  empire  how  many  times  he  had  performed  a  certain  wonderful 
feat  in  surgery.  He  replied  that  he  had  performed  the  operation 
thirteen  times. 

"Ah,  but,  monsieur,  I  have  done  him  one  hundred  and  sixty 
times." 

"  How  many  times  did  you  save  his  life.''  "  continued  the  French- 


The  Editor. 


357 


man  after  he  had  looked  at  the  blank  amazement  of  Sir  Astley's 
face, 

"  I,"  said  the  Englishman,  "  saved  eleven  out  of  the  thirteen. 
How  many  did  you  save  out  of  one  hundred  and  sixty  ?  " 

"  Ah,  monsieur,  1  lose  dem  all  ;  but  de  operation  was  very  brill- 
iant." 

Of  how  many  popular  preachers  might  the  same  verdict  be  ren- 
dered !  Souls  are  not  saved,  but  the  preaching  is  very  brilliant. 
Thousands  are  attracted  and  operated  on  by  the  rhetorician's  art, 
but  what  if  he  should  have  to  say  of  his  admirers,  "  I  lost  them  all, 
but  the  sermons  were  very  brilliant  ?  " 

ALL  HEAD. 

Robert  Collyer  implies  in  a  late  speech  that  "  it  is  a  shame  for  a 
man  with  a  great  level  head  to  be  a  Methodist."  Methodists  will 
say  such  talkers  should  omit  the  word  "  level "  from  their  portraits 
of  themselves.  It  is  a  "  big  head  "  which  indulges  in  such  opinions, 
a  head  not  unlike  that  which  Irving  says  a  Dutchman,  in  upper  New 
York,  put  upon  his  carriage  when  the  city  had  made  him  rich  by 
running  streets  through  his  cabbage-patch.  He  set  up  a  carriage, 
and  put  upon  its  panel,  as  his  coat  of  arms,  a  huge  cabbage-head 
with  Alles  Kopf,"  "  All  head,"  as  its  motto.  Is  that  the  motto  of 
"  big  Bob  ?  " 

He  was  fond  of  telling  unbelievers  of  all  shades  and 
degrees  that  the  true  reason  why  they  did  not  under- 
stand Christianity,  the  Bible,  the  Church,  and  the  vital- 
ity of  an  active  faith,  is  because  that  knowledge  had 
never  been  brought  home  to  them  in  a  living  and  sav- 
ing experience. 

Nothing  worries  our  Unitarian  friends  so  much  as  Methodist  ex- 
perience. Thus  "  The  Register  "  indulges  in  criticism  of  a  subject 
of  which  it  is  as  ignorant  as  a  Yankee  baby  of  Sanscrit  : 


358 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


"  Confessing  one's  sins,  talking  over  one's  experience,  is  hardly 
the  thing  to  do  systematically.  Very  few  can  do  so,  and  it  is 
doubtful  if  those  few  are  better  for  doing  it.  Practically,  the  class- 
leaders  find  that  great  artificiality  results ;  often  the  tone  of  the 
whole  class  is  set  by  the  first  person  who  speaks.  And  these  class- 
meetings  do  not  stand  alone.  They  are  but  part — with  love-feasts, 
prayer- meetings,  and  the  rest — of  a  great  machinery  for  keeping  up 
piety  at  a  fever  heat.  There  is  altogether  too  much  of  it.  It  tends 
to  put  the  strain  of  religious  effort  on  keeping  up  excited  feeling, 
instead  of  on  living  righteousness.  It  is,  moreover,  morally  exhaust- 
ing rather  than  strengthening.  It  tends  to  morbid  introspection  and 
self-consciousness  :  and  it  is  almost  as  bad  to  be  always  thinking  of 
one's  sins  as  of  one's  righteousness.  Methodism  has  done  a  good 
thing  in  teaching  the  Churches  the  way  to  a  closer,  homelier,  relig- 
ious fellowship  ;  but  it  has  turned  that  fellowship  too  much  into 
experience-telling,  and  too  much  into  emotion,  and  has  made  its 
greatest  blunder  in  insisting  upon  it  as  a  formal  condition  of  mem- 
bership." 

How  little  such  censurers  know  of  the  subject.  The  class-meet- 
ing is  not  a  dull  repetition  of  the  leader.  It  is  a  rare  feast  of  liberty 
and  individuality.  A  good  leader  brings  out  the  personality  of  its 
members.  Nor  are  the  latter  words  more  true.  The  very  richness 
and  strength  of  Church-life  are  accounted  "  morbid  ;"  the  delightful 
"experience-telling,"  which  never  tires  a  Christian  heart,  is  "made 
too  much  of."  Would  that  our  friends  could  gain  that  experience. 
How  quickly  would  they  exult  in  telling  it  always  and  every-where. 
May  they  soon  experience  this  true  and  only  Christian  fellowship, 
and  find  this  only  basis  for  a  Christian  Church— one  heart,  and  then 
one  mind. 

Laird  Collier  told  the  Boston  Music  Hallers,  Anniversary  Sunday, 
that  "  when  we  all  get  to  heaven,  as  we  all  certainly  shall,  many  of 
us  will  beheve  that  we  have  got  into  the  wrong  place."  No  doubt 
of  that.  They  will  all  wish  themselves  out  of  it,  and  pray  Christ,  as 
did  the  poor  devils  at  Gadara,  to  suffer  them  to  go  away  from  Him. 
For  all  those  cheerers  hate  and  despise  Christ,  Christianity,  and 


The  Editor.  359 

Christians,  as  our  former  brother  well  knows.  He  brought  down 
the  house  by  his  hits  at  the  truth  of  Christ,  and  even  made  his  prayer 
so  antichristian  as  to  receive  applause  at  its  close.  The  applause 
was  from  sinful  men,  and  not  from  Him  to  whom  it  was  professedly 
addressed.  It  was  proper,  however,  as  it  came  from  those  who  were 
really  addressed.  -  Poor  Laird  ! 

Despite  his  incessant  war  upon  them,  he  enjoyed  the 
personal  good-will  of  many  of  these  editorial  enemies. 
After  his  election  to  the  episcopate  the  "  Register " 
celebrated  the  semi-centennial  anniversary  of  its  estab- 
lishment, and  a  courteous  invitation  was  sent  him  to 
join  them  in  the  banquet  at  the  Commonwealth  Hotel. 
He  was  obliged  to  decline  on  account  of  official  duties, 
but  said,  "  I  am  glad  to  see  that  it  was  in  your  hearts  to 
fulfill  the  scriptural  injunction,  '  If  thine  enemy  hunger, 
feed  him.'  "  Haven  had  been  the  most  effective  adver- 
sary whom  they  had  for  a.  long  time  encountered. 
Small  wonder  that  one  of  the  editors  of  the  "  Register" 
declared,  when  he  had  left  Boston,  that  it  would  be 
easier  to  edit  a  Unitarian  paper  there. 

Another  conspicuous  service  rendered  by  Mr.  Haven 
in  Zion's  Herald,"  to  the  Churches  of  Christ  and  the 
American  people,  was  his  large  part  in  shaming  the 
"  New  York  Tribune,"  the  Springfield  Republican," 
and  the  Boston  "  Transcript,"  in  their  shamelessly  unfair 
course  toward  the  Evangelical  Churches.  The  "  Her- 
ald "  printed  a  number  of  criticisms  and  hints  about 
their  ill-judged  course  like  this : 

The  "Watchman  and  Reflector  "  has  this  word  of  exhortation  for 
a  sheet  that  needs  it.    All  Evangelical  Churches  fare  equally  badly 


36o 


Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 


at  its  hands.  It  is  sectarian,  of  the  skeptical  sect,  and  after  the 
most  straitest  of  that  sect  it  lives  a  Sadducee. 

"  Why  cannot  the  '  Springfield  Republican  '  do  the  fair  thing  by 
its  patrons  ?  While  a  large  portion  of  its  readers  are  evangelical  in 
their  sentiments,  it  apparently  loses  no  opportunity  to  hold  up  those 
sentiments  to  ridicule,  and  gives  free  scope  in  its  columns  to  the 
fullest  presentations  of  the  Free-religionists  of  the  day.  We  do  not 
ask  the  '  Republican  '  to  be  sectarian,  or  have  any  religious  bias,  but 
we  do  ask  it  to  be  fair  to  all  sides." 

In  a  like  spirit  he  labored  with  the  "  Transcript :  " 

The  "  Transcript  "  grows  more  and  more  denominational.  Among 
its  editorial  notes  it  speaks  of  the  Unitarian  Sunday-schools  as  "  our 
Sunday-schools,"  and  talks  of  its  fifty  thousand  readers  as  if  they 
were  all  of  that  sort.  It  talked  about  Robert  Collyer  as  we  said  it 
would  when  he  came  to  Boston,  in  a  pile  of  paragraphs  ;  though  it 
evidently  felt  our  suggestion,  and  apologized  for  its  frequent  praise. 
It  does  not  seem  necessary  for  the  Unitarian  Association  to  be  at  the 
expense  of  publishing  the  "  Register,"  when  the  "  Transcript  "  does 
their  work  so  well.  Better  devote  that  money  also  to  "  Brother 
Collyer." 

The  "  Watchman  and  Reflector  "  has  evidently  been  reading  the 
"  Transcript,"  and  some  other  dailies,  for  it  asks  this  question  :  "  Was 
any  other  Church  burned  in  Chicago  besides  the  Rev.  Robert  Coll- 
yer's  ?  The  first  reports  of  the  fire  set  the  number  at  seventy,  or 
thereabouts,  but  as  Collyer's  is  the  only  one  mentioned  of  late,  the 
reports  must  have  been  erroneous.  If  perchance  it  should  appear 
that  some  other  church  edifice  w^as  destroyed,  we  hope  the  generous- 
hearted  will  remember  it."  Perhaps  that  gossip  can  give  the  in- 
formation craved. 

The  journals  inculpated  in  these  sharp  and  persistent 
paragraphs  endeavored  to  vindicate  themselves  before 
their  own  readers.    Particularly  the  "  Springfield  Re- 


The  Editor. 


publican  "  attempted  this,  but  in  such  a  vein  that  the 
"  Herald  "  set  the  matter  right  in  a  brief  editorial,  whose 
points  we  give : 

The  "  Spi  ingfield  Republican  "  has  made  several  references  to  our 
comments  on  its  course  in  respect  to  skepticism  and  Christianity, 
and  lately  devoted  an  editorial  to  the  question  involved.  It  claims 
that  it  is  tolerant,  because  it  publishes  all  sides  of  all  questions.  It 
has  published  two  sermons  the  past  year,  one  by  Dr.  Hopkins,  and 
one  by  Mr.  Frothingham.  That  it  calls  equality.  Is  Mr.  Frothing- 
ham's  half  dozen  equal  to  all  the  Church  of  Christ  whose  central 
doctrine  Dr.  Hopkins  defended  ?  It  publishes  many  more  notices 
and  synopses  of  orthodox  meetings  and  sermons  than  of  heterodox. 
This  it  claims  is  fair  and  equal  to  all  parties. 

It  mistakes  the  point  of  complaint.  It  is  not  its  impartial  reports 
of  all  public  meetings  which  are  condemned,  but  its  partial  devotion 
to  semi-public  meetings  of  an  anti-evangelical  type.  Its  editorial 
spirit,  tone,  and  words  are  manifestly  in  accord  with  such  sentiments. 
It  devotes  more  space  to  the  Radical  Club  than  to  all  evangelical 
gatherings  of  a  like  sort,  and  many  a  brief  editorial  note  is  wrought 
in  the  same  spirit.  We  referred  to  one  a  week  or  two  ago  which 
ridiculed  all  summer  work  of  the  Church.  It  has  many  such.  If  it 
needs  to  learn  the  difference  between  mere  reports  and  its  own 
skeptical  flavors,  it  will  find  it  out  by  referring  to  the  columns  of  the 
"Journal,"  or  "Advertiser."  They  have  as  ample  reports  of  all 
public  meetings  as  it  has,  but  they  do  not  hunt  out  half  private  seances 
which  itch  for  popularity  and  publicity,  and  whose  little  parlor- 
full  of  quidnuncs  would  die  without  relief  of  this  passion,  did  not 
the  "Republican,"  or  the  "  Tribune,"  which  the  former  imitates  in 
this  respect,  come  to  their  aid  } 

Nor  do  those  papers  ever,  by  innuendo  or  by  direct  fling  and  stab, 
strike  at  the  Christian  Church  and  the  Gospel  of  Christ,  as  the  "Re- 
publican "  often  does.  Labored  editorials  it  has  once  and  again  pub- 
lished in  hostility  to  the  accepted  doctrines  of  Christianity.  ...  It 

carried  this  effrontery  to  the  utmost  when  it  published,  evidently 
16 


362 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


from  manuscript,  and  without  a  note  of  disapproval,  that  worse  than 
heathen  sermon  of  Mr.  Frothingham's,  which  practically  and  in 
intent,  denied  not  only  the  resurrection,  but  immortality. 

It  is  in  error  when  it  says  we  "  want  it  to  take  up  the  cudgels  of 
sectarian  dispute,  and  thwack  our  adversaries  over  the  head  with 
it."  We  ask  no  favor  at  its  hands  for  the  Church  of  Christ  in  any 
of  its  branches,  organs,  or  offices.  The  Church  needs  no  cudgels 
for  any  back,  not  even  the  '  Republican's.'  It  only  asks  fair  play  on  the 
part  of  those  journals  which  profess  to  cater  to  the  whole  commu- 
nity. We  only  trust  that  until  it  abandons  its  pen-snappings  against 
the  Church  and  Christianity,  it  will  not  assume  that  it  is  innocent  of 
all  such  attempted  brilliancies.    It  must  remember  that, 

"  In  many  ways  doth  the  full  heart  reveal. 

The  presence  of  the  love  it  would  conceal  ; 

And  in  more  ways  the  estranged  heart  makes  known. 

The  absence  of  the  love  that  still  it  fain  would  own." 

Another  difficult  service  rendered  by  Mr.  Haven,  of 
great  advantage  to  the  Church,  was  his  steady  and 
skillful  advocacy  of  the  Lay  Representation  movement. 
The  object  of  the  movement  v/as  to  introduce  a  lay 
representation  into  the  General  Conference,  the  su- 
preme legislative  and  judicial  assembly  of  the  Church, 
which  had  been  made  up  until  then  solely  of  clerical 
members.  He  had  long  been  in  favor  of  the  measure, 
but  had  found  the  New  England  Conference  strongly 
opposed  to  this  scheme,  under  the  leadership  of  Drs. 
James  Porter,  L.  R.  Thayer,  Mallalieu,  and  other  in- 
fluential members.  The  Conference  had  been  so  strong- 
ly committed  to  opposition  to  this  change  in  the  Con- 
stitution of  the  Church,  that  it  was  jealous  of  any  action 
that  seemed  even  remotely  to  sanction  such  aims. 

So  palpable  was  this  sentiment  of  that  body  that  the 


The  Editor.  363 

boldest  advocate  of  the  cause  of  the  laymen  did  not 
hope  to  procure  any  directly  different  measures.  As 
late  as  1864  Mr.  Haven  sought  a  roundabout  indorse- 
ment of  this  principle,  all  he  dared  to  ask,  by  a  resolu- 
tion in  the  terms  following: 

If  any  plan  of  Lay  Representation  is  adopted  by  the  General  Con- 
ference, our  delegates  are  instructed  to  see  to  it,  that  it  is  based  upon 
the  only  true  and  Christian  foundation,  the  entire  membership  of  the 
Church. 

This  was  an  attempt  to  get  the  Conference  to  seem  to 
say  something  in  behalf  of  Lay  Representation  through 
interest  in  the  slave  or  freedman,  which  it  would  not  say 
on  the  general  merits  of  the  issue. 

It  seemed  successful,  for  it  went  through  without  a 
dissenting  voice,  and  the  author  of  the  resolution  was 
just  congratulating  himself  on  this  advance,  when  Dr. 
Porter  got  in  a  resolution  saying  that  the  one  just  passed 
was  not  intended  to  neutralize  the  action  of  1862.  And 
this  resolution  went  through  in  spite  of  Mr.  Haven's 
endeavor  to  modify  by  substituting  for  neutralize," 
is  not  intended  to  express  any  opinion  on  the  action 
of  1862."  We  may  give  the  briefest  view  of  the  reasons 
on  which  he  founded  his  appeals  for  this  change  in  his 
own  words,  as  found  in  his  pamphlet  on  the  subject  : 

We  shall  seek  to  show,  first,  that  Lay  Representation  is  right ; 
and,  second,  that  it  is  expedient.  By  expediency  we  mean  that  it  is 
the  safe,  and  only  safe  way. 

I.  It  is  right. 

I.  Because  the  divinely  organized  Church  of  the  old  and  new  dis' 
pensations  was  organized  upon  this  principle. 


3^4 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


2.  Because  all  subsequent  Church  history,  with  one  fatal  excep- 
tion, approves  it. 

3.  Because  the  Constitution  of  the  Church  into  which  and  out  of 
which  we  were  born  is  established  upon  the  doctrine,  and  hence 
our  Church  in  England  during  the  lifetime  of  Wesley  was  nec- 
essarily subject  to  it. 

4.  It  is  the  spontaneous  Christian  instinct  of  every  believer,  lay  or 
clerical. 

5.  It  is  according  to  the  spirit  of  our  age,  and  especially  of  our 
Nation. 

6.  It  will  relieve  us  of  a  long-felt  reproach  to  which  our  present 
abnormal  system  is  subjected,  and  from  which  all  the  clerical  patron- 
age of  the  laity  cannot  deliver  it. 

7.  It  will  introduce  into  the  highest  councils  of  the  Church  a  vast 
amount  of  practical  talent  of  the  highest  order,  that  is  now  sub- 
stantially unavailable. 

8.  It  will  reduce  the  peril  arising  from  ministerial  ambition,  a 
grievous  peril  in  great  and  growing  Churches  like  our  own. 

9.  It  will  increase  the  confidence  of  the  Church  in  the  conclusions 
of  such  a  blended  representation,  and  will  insure  a  speedier  and 
heartier  execution  of  its  progressive  decrees. 

II.  It  is  expedient. 

1.  Because  it  is  always  expedient  to  do  right. 

2.  Because  the  subject  is  familiar,  not  hastily  sprung  on  the  Church. 

3.  Because  there  are  greater  facilities  and  larger  means  for  such 
a  representation  now  than  when  first  demanded. 

4.  Because  our  laity  are  already  occupying  such  positions  of  in- 
fluence and  importance  in  the  community  as  makes  their  presence 
in  the  councils  of  the  Church  a  necessity. 

5.  Because  the  discharge  of  this  duty  will  not  imperil  our  itiner- 
ancy, nor  the  rightful  claims  and  distinctions  of  the  ministers,  but 
will  establish  them. 

Skillful  as  was  his  exposition  and  courageous  as  was 
his  advocacy  of  such  views,  he  never  was  able  to  change 


The  Editor.  365 

the  current  of  opinion  on  that  subject  in  his  own  Con- 
ference. As  late  as  1868,  when  the  reform  was  on  the 
verge  of  success,  the  Journal  says:  "Conference  met 
last  week ;  discussion  was  very  warm  on  Lay  Represent- 
ation, and  we  lost  it." 

Yet  it  should  not  be  supposed  that  all  these  services 
were  rendered  the  Church  and  the  world  without  arous- 
ing any  hostility.  There  were  abundant  complaints 
about  the  course  of  the  Herald."  We  have  seen  that 
he  virtually  made  it  an  advocate  of  the  "  Temperance  " 
party  when  Wendell  Phillips  ran  for  the  gubernatorial 
chair.  This  was  a  bold  thing  to  do  at  a  time  when  very 
few  of  the  readers  of  the  paper  agreed  with  him,  and 
the  "  Wesleyan  Association,"  perhaps,  cast  a  solid  vote 
for  Governor  Claflin.  He  had  serious  opposition  to  con- 
tend with  from  his  warmest  friends  on  this  matter  ;  but 
somebody  had  convinced  him  that  his  course  in  the  past 
dictated  his  action  for  the  new  party  as  against  the 
Republicans. 

The  paper  was  blamed  on  other  grounds.  People 
complained  that  it  was  too  literary,  too  reformatory, 
too  pugilistic,  too  jocose,  and  too  secular.  But  the 
very  men  who  made  these  criticisms  usually  were  also 
free  to  confess  that  the  "  Herald  "  had  taken  on  a  new 
life  and  power  under  Mr.  Haven.  People  saw  that  it  was 
influencing  the  Church  and  the  country  as  it  never  had 
done,  and  that  its  influence  on  the  whole  was  very 
wholesome.  They  saw,  too,  that  the  editor's  skill  and 
force  won  wide  recognition  in  the  newspaper  world. 

His  management  of  the  "  Herald  "  was  not  publicly 


366  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

assailed,  but  at  one  time  a  desperate  attack  was  made 
on  his  work  among  the  members  of  the  "  Wesleyan 
Association."  A  letter  was  written  by  an  influential 
member  of  the  New  England  Conference,  then  resident 
in  New  York,  indorsing  the  various  complaints  then  cur- 
rent, and  demanding  a  change  in  the  editorial  chair  as 
a  condition  of  peace.  Possibly  the  assault  would  have 
met  with  some  sympathy  in  the  Association,"  had  its 
tone  been  more  prudent.  But  the  writer  threatened  a 
new  paper  in  case  his  demands  were  not  complied  with, 
and  that  threat  defeated  itself;  for  the  managers  of  the 
"  Herald  "  stood  firmly  by  the  new  editor  in  his  general 
course,  and  the  new  paper  remained  unborn. 

One  thing  which  made  the  matter  easier  for  Mr. 
Haven  was  the  general  public  recognition  of  his  edito- 
rial success.  He  had  no  real  doubts  that  he  should 
achieve  success  when  he  accepted  the  position,  so  that 
his  popularity  as  editor  was  no  surprise  to  him.  But  he 
meant  to  make  his  personal  success  help  forward  the 
ideas  to  whose  spread  he  was  of  old  devoted.  It  was 
the  perception  that  he  had  won  recognition  for  them  as 
well  as  himself  that  made  his  satisfaction  complete.  He 
had  sent  them  over  all  the  land,  assured  that  they  would 
yield  a  fruitful  harvest. 

His  skill  and  courage  as  an  editor  led  to  efforts 
on  the  part  of  different  journals  to  secure  his  services. 
He  was  once  offered  the  editorial  chair  of  the  "  Boston 
Traveller,"  but  he  declined  the  honor  because  it  was  not 
within  his  proper  line.  Dr.  Curry  would  have  given 
him  $4,000  a  year  as  assistant  editor  of  the  Christian 


The  Editor.  367 

Advocate."  Mr.  Bowen,  of  "  The  Independent,"  like- 
wise made  him  several  offers  in  connection  with  that 
paper.  One  was  to  be  joint  editor  with  Mr.  Tilton,  and 
"  having  full  authority  over  the  religious  department." 
The  final  offer  was  the  full  editorship  of  "  The  Inde- 
pendent "  with  a  salary  of  §7,000,  and  work  on  The 
Christian  Union,"  which  would  have  yielded  $3,000 
more.  These  offers  he  submitted  to  his  friends,  with 
the  usual  demands  for  advice.  Some  advised  him  to 
stay  in  the  "  Herald,"  and  others  to  go  to  "  The  Inde- 
pendent," and  among  the  latter  were  Bishop  Ames, 
Dr.  Whedon,  Dr.  Hatfield,  and  Dr.  E.  O.  Haven.  His 
path  in  the  "  Herald  "  was  yet  by  no  means  free  from 
difficulties  and  opposition ;  yet  he  declined  these  flat- 
tering offers.  The  Journal  says:  "I  do  not  see  my 
way  clear  yet.  Duty  seems  to  call  me  here."  To 
friends  who  thought  he  had  made  a  great  mistake  he 
responded  with  a  smile,  "  Except  these  abide  in  the 
ship,  ye  cannot  be  saved." 

Mr.  Haven  had  often  set  his  face  against  the  habit  of 
taking  such  outside  positions  by  Methodist  clergymen, 
in  public  and  private  correspondence.  He  thought  it  a 
loss  to  the  Church  of  a  serious  character,  and  hence  he 
declined  to  set  an  example  which  he  deemed  pernicious. 
He  made  no  parade  of  these  long  published  convictions, 
but  they  had  decisive  influence  on  his  conduct. 


368 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  XIX. 
haven  in  conference. 

A  Genial  Critic— Position  in  Conference —Devotion  to  Christian  Truth— Fidelity  to 
Methodism— His  Vivid  Convictions— Relations  with  Reformers— Administrative  Ability 
—Quick  Perception  of  Talent— Wide  Acquaintance  with  Men— In  the  Gene  al  Confer- 
ence of  1868— Election  to  the  Bishopric  in  1872— His  Consecration. 

TOURING  the  early  years  of  Mr.  Haven's  connection 
^  with  the  New  England  Conference  probably  few 
thought  him  likely  to  become  a  leader  there,  or  influen- 
tial in  the  general  affairs  of  the  Church.  He  was  not  an 
attractive  preacher,  his  gifts  for  administration  had  not 
yet  rendered  him  prominent,  while  his  ultra  views  sub- 
jected him  to  much  honest  ridicule  and  some  that  was 
not  so  honest.  The  freedom  and  severity  of  his  criticism 
of  public  events  and  men  gave  many  the  notion  that  he 
was  either  a  sorehead  or  visionary.  People  who  heard 
him  blaming  special  defects  in  the  Constitution  of  the 
Church,  or  pointing  out  errors  in  the  general  adminis- 
tration of  affairs,  sometimes  doubted  his  loyalty  to  the 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  One  of  his  early  news- 
paper articles  spoke  his  thoughts  with  so  much  unre- 
serve that  good  Bishop  Janes,  to  whom  its  substance 
had  been  stated,  cried  out,  Don't  tell  me  the  author's 
name,  I  fear  I  could  not  do  him  ju  stice  in  his  appoint- 
ments." 

But  such  people  soon  found  out  that  this  keen-sighted 


Haven  in  Conference.  369 

critic  was  neither  sour  nor  malicious  in  his  writings.  His 
sunny  temper  and  Christian  spirit  infused  themselves 
into  all  that  he  said  and  did  so  fully  that  such  miscon- 
ceptions speedily  gave  way.  Men  began  to  observe 
that  he  had  an  inevitable  eye  for  excellence  of  every 
sort,  and  that  his  praise  was  readier  and  warmer  than 
his  blame.  This  was  so  marked  a  trait  that  the  sugges- 
tion readily  obtrudes  itself  that  Mr.  Haven  must  have 
been  drawn  to  this  prudent  conduct  through  deliberate 
policy.  Seeing  how  critical  his  attitude  had  become 
toward  certain  institutions  and  their  advocates  or  apolo- 
gists in  Church  and  State  before  he  entered  the  pulpit, 
one  naturally  thinks  that  he  foresaw  the  need  of  flavor- 
ing abundant  and  unsparing  criticism  with  generous 
praise.  But  the  same  qualities  show  themselves  in  his 
private  letters,  and  his  first  communications  to  the  jour- 
nals about  educational  matters,  and  it  was  the  man's  in- 
most nature  that  spoke  in  all  such  kindly  utterances. 

But,  as  the  years  went  past,  Mr.  Haven  had  quite  natur- 
ally grown  to  a  leading  position  in  his  own  Conference. 
His  radical  views  on  slavery,  caste,  temperance,  co-educa- 
tion, and  women's  rights  had,  for  the  most  part,  long  been 
popular  in  that  body.  "  Nearly  every  body  agreed  with 
him  on  the  main  points,  though  at  some  point  he  went 
farther  than  almost  any  body  else  would  go.  Some  dis- 
approved his  notions  concerning  caste  or  women's  rights, 
who,  nevertheless,  had  a  great  admiration  for  the  self- 
denial,  patience,  and  courage  with  which  he  explained  and 
defended  his  general  position.    Even  where  men  of  more 

conservative  temper  failed  to  accept  his  conceptions  con- 
16* 


370  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

cerning  the  duty  of  the  nation  or  the  Church  on  some 
particular  topic,  a  thrill  of  admiration  sometimes  stole 
over  them  as  he  sought  to  show  that  his  ideas  had  their 
vital  roots  in  Christianity,  and  that  no  political  or  relig- 
ious millennium  could  come  until  they  were  carried  out. 
There  was  always  a  fraction  of  the  New  England  Con- 
ference which  doubted  the  practical  wisdom  of  some  of 
his  favorite  measures,  but  their  doubts  gradually  ceased 
to  influence  the  vote  against  them. 

His  thorough  devotion  to  evangelical  religion  gave 
him  a  strong  hold  on  a  body  that  has  had  to  contend 
for  such  principles  as  for  life,  under  steady,  subtile,  and 
unrelenting  criticism.  He  believed  the  entire  Christian 
creed  with  full  and  unswerving  faith.  The  Bible  is 
God's  word  all  through,  from  Genesis  to  Revelation. 
He  held  the  extremest  view  of  the  fullness,  power,  and 
pervasiveness  of  divine  inspiration.  The  Father,  Son, 
and  Holy  Ghost  were  realities  in  his  worship  and  belief. 
Heaven  and  hell  were  real  places,  like  London  and 
New  York:  devils  and  angels  as  real  as  his  enemies  and 
friends  in  this  world.  The  scriptural  doctrines  concern- 
ing man's  sinfulness  and  redemption  were  more  real 
than  the  constitution  and  laws  of  the  great  Republic. 
On  all  such  subjects  he  held  the  common  faith  of  the 
Christian  world,  but  his  mental  character  gave  a  vital 
intensity  to  his  creed  such  as  less  imaginative  men  rarely 
show. 

One  day  a  young  minister  blamed  Spurgeon  for  say- 
ing that  hell  is  an  actual  place,  and  its  fires  material 
flame.    "  Why  not,"  Haven  broke  in,    why  not  ?  Take 


Haven  in  Conference.  371 

a  harlot  whose  den  is  in  North  Street  and  whose  vices 
are  consuming  her  body  through  syphilis.  There  is  a 
material  fire  actually  consuming  her  body  in  this  world. 
Why  not  in  the  next?"  This  way  of  looking  at  the 
Scriptures  as  intended  to  teach  those  great  and  broad 
lessons  which  they  obviously  convey  to  plain  Christian 
people  rallied  every-where  to  his  side  a  multitude  whom 
his  political  and  social  ideas  might  have  repelled.  They 
felt  that  he  was  true  to  the  old  traditional  orthodoxy 
of  the  great  historic  Churches  of  the  world,  and  that  he 
could  be  depended  on  neither  to  give  nor  accept  quarter 
on  all  the  issues  of  living  faith  in  opposition  to  the 
pretentious  liberalism  of  the  times. 

It  was  the  same  with  his  strongly  pronounced  views 
concerning  Methodistic  doctrines  and  ecclesiastical  work. 
He  was  a  firm  believer  in  the  peculiar  doctrines  to 
which  the  Wesleys  and  their  followers  gave  such  em- 
phatic utterance.  He  had  come  into  his  belief  in  them, 
not  merely  from  study  and  argument,  but  in  the  vital 
ways  of  personal  experience.  He  had  been  a  conscious 
and  convicted  sinner.  His  soul  had  been  justified  freely 
through  a  faith  that  appropriated  to  itself  the  benefits 
of  Christ's  sacrifice  and  intercession,  and  made  a  new 
creature  in  Christ  through  the  renewal  of  the  Holy 
Ghost.  When  he  spoke  of  these  profound  personal  ex- 
periences in  pulpit  discourse  or  in  private  conversation 
there  was  no  limping  uncertainty  in  his  deliverances. 
This  deep  inwardness  of  his  love  to  God  ran  through 
all  his  theological  thinking,  inspired  all  his  work,  and 
commended  him  to  all  of  like  precious  faith. 


3/2  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

He  also  deemed  the  special  institutions  developed  by 
Method  ism  the  best  suited  to  do  her  reformatory  and 
saving  work.  He  liked  the  itinerant  ministry,  the  local 
ministry,  the  class-meeting,  the  prayer-meeting,  the 
love-feast,  the  watch  night,  the  quarterly  meeting,  the 
revival  services,  the  mourners'  bench,  and  the  inquiry- 
meeting.  He  thought  that  the  success  and  triumph  of 
the  Church  would  come,  not  through  discarding  such 
methods  of  operation,  but  by  working  them  under  the 
highest  pressure  of  Christian  love  and  zeal.  All  these 
convictions  he  carried  out  in  his  own  ministry  with  such 
steady  fervor  as  to  make  deep  and  lasting  impressions 
on  many  of  his  auditors. 

Mr.  Haven's  profound  interest  in  the  popular  reforms 
of  the  day  brought  him  into  sympathetic  relations  with 
many  of  the  leading  men  who  bore  a  prominent  part 
in  those  movements.  Some  of  them  were  of  other 
Christian  denominations,  some  indifferent  to  religion  as 
an  inward  life,  and  some  avowed  unbelievers;  but  all 
were  drawn  warmly  toward  the  Methodist  preacher 
whose  devotion  to  reform  shamed  their  own.  Such 
connections  tended  to  make  Mr.  Haven  widely  known 
outside  his  own  Church.  One  result  of  this  was  that 
these  people  frequently  sought  to  obtain  through  him 
any  desirable  action  in  their  special  fields  on  the  part 
of  the  Methodist  Church.  He  used  their  example 
to  shamic  indifferent  ministers,  and  preached  to  the  re- 
formers the  necessity  of  purging  their  movements  of  ir- 
religious elements.  He  told  them  that  such  elements 
not  only  kept  very  many  earnest  and  devoted  Chris- 


Haven  in  Conference.  373 

tian  people  from  joining  them,  but  also  that  unbelief 
and  real  reform  in  human  society  are  incompatible.  It 
was  perfectly  understood  that  he  always  brought  with 
him  to  their  meetings  his  personal  faith,  and  that  he 
would  be  quite  likely  to  air  it  in  their  discussions  and 
his  public  addresses. 

Mr.  Haven  had  gradually  become  at  home  in  all  the 
administrative  work  of  his  own  Conference.  He  had 
much  to  do  with  the  starting  and  working  of  the  New 
England  Conference  Church  Aid  Society,  which  did  in 
a  limited  field  much  the  same  work  now  done  in  the 
entire  body  by  the  Church  Extension  Society.  He 
served  on  all  sorts  of  committees  of  a  practical  sort,  and 
was  fruitful  in  resources  in  times  of  emergency.  If  he 
wished  to  get  any  thing  done  it  was  pretty  sure  to  be 
brought  about.  If  he  was  not  in  a  position  to  act,  he 
always  knew  who  was,  and  the  gift  of  persuasion  was 
strong  in  him.  This  was,  in  part,  because  he  saw  so 
clearly  what  could  and  could  not  be  done  in  a  given 
case.  It  soon  became  the  habit  of  many  of  his  seniors 
in  the  ministry  to  turn  toward  him  for  counsel,  for  sug- 
gestions about  practical  work,  and  for  his  influence  with 
men  not  easy  of  access. 

One  trait  which,  in  the  course  of  events,  gave  him  a 
large  influence  with  men  was  his  finding  out  so  prompt- 
ly the  special  gift  and  ability  of  men  about  him.  He 
wrote  to  his  classmate,  Jones,  away  back  in  1852  : 
"  John  W.  Beach  is  fitting  himself  for  the  White  House 
at  Middletown  by  great  success  in  the  smaller  one  at 
Amenia."    This  fine  gift  of  appreciation  never  failed 


374  Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 

him.  When  he  was  a  member  of  the  Maiden  congre- 
gation he  entered  in  his  Journal  such  words  as  these  : 
Heard  Brother  Barnes  preach  his  last  sermon  save  one 
this  morning.  He  has  had  great  success  here.  He  is  a 
fine  fellow,  genial,  whole-souled,  eloquent."  Of  the 
next  preacher  he  says  :  "  Brother  Townsend  is  a  young 
man  of  much  talent,  of  deep  nature,  of  earnest  spirit, 
fine  scholarship,  writing  choice  sermons.  .  .  .  The 
Church  will  yet  know  him,  if  he  abides  in  her  pulpits, 
as  one  of  her  great  and  shining  lights."  There  was  no- 
body in  the  Maiden  pulpit  while  Mr.  Haven  waited  on 
its  ministry  for  whom  he  did  not  record  som^e  such  ex- 
pression of  generous  and  intelligent  judgment,  and 
almost  every  exchanging  minister  was  touched  off  in  the 
same  true  and  pleasant  way. 

This  turn  of  mind  showed  itself  about  other  things 
than  mere  preaching.  If  any  member  of  his  Conference 
had  a  talent  for  succeeding  through  pastoral  work,  revi- 
valistic  power,  Sunday-school  management,  social  tact, 
financial  skill,  his  particular  gift  could  not  be  hidden 
from  those  keen  eyes.  He  knew  the  special  needs  of  a 
large  part  of  the  societies,  and  often  made  wise  sugges- 
tions to  such  of  their  pastors  as  came  within  his  range. 
When  he  became  editor  of  "  Zion's  Herald  "  all  these 
qualities  had  full  range  and  scope.  He  was  always 
ready  to  preach  for  any  one  who  was  sick,  or  over- 
driven with  pastoral  labors,  or  who  took  leave  to  invite 
him  with  or  without  good  reason. 

The  perpetual  loneUness  of  soul  which  weighed  upon 
Mr.  Haven  in  consequence  of  his  wife's  death  made  in- 


Haven  in  Conference.  375 

terruptions  of  this  kind  rather  welcome  to  him  than 
otherwise.  He  visited  several  camp-meetings  in  course 
of  every  year,  and  was  ready  to  bear  a  hand  in  any 
honest  religious  labor  that  offered  itself.  His  paper 
made  him  known  throughout  New  England,  and 
brought  him  into  demand  in  many  places  as  preacher 
or  lecturer.  He  spoke  in  lyceum  courses,  and  at  school 
and  college  anniversaries  on  literary  topics.  And  he 
was  ready  to  speak  on  the  temperance  question  or 
woman's  rights  at  a  moment's  warning.  Thus  he  had 
come  into  direct  contact  with  Methodists  in  all  parts  of 
New  England  during  the  term  of  his  service  as  editor 
of  the  Herald."  For  him  to  come  in  contact  with 
people  was  to  make  of  many  of  them  warm  friends. 
Even  where  he  provoked  repugnance  and  opposition,  it 
was  usually  to  his  notions  rather  than  to  himself.  His 
ability  as  a  preacher  and  lecturer  had  been  growing 
during  all  this  period,  and  that  growth  had  set  men  to 
thinking  as  to  what  higher  usefulness  lay  before  him. 

He  had  been  a  candidate  for  General  Conference  as 
early  as  1864,  but  had  been  defeated  partly  in  conse- 
quence of  misrepresentations  that  had  been  circulated 
against  him.  He  was  chosen  four  years  later  a  member 
of  the  General  Conference,  which  held  its  session  in 
Chicago.  He  was  a  hard-working,  useful,  and  jolly 
member.  The  question  of  Lay  Representation  was  dis- 
cussed warmly  before  that  body,  and  the  debate  awak- 
ened such  general  interest  as  to  provoke  the  ablest 
members  to  a  full  exertion  of  their  powers.  Mr.  Haven 
wrote  a  speech,  and  read  it  with  so  much  dash  and 


3/6  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

spirit,  that  he  made  something  of  an  impression  on  the 
body. 

Before  the  session  of  the  General  Conference  of  1872 
Mr.  Haven's  name  had  been  mentioned  pretty  widely 
as  one  likely  to  be  summoned  to  episcopal  honors  and 
burdens.  This  kind  of  talk  obtained  pretty  largely  at 
first  among  the  younger  members  of  the  New  England 
Conferences.  There  was  hardly  a  Conference  in  New 
England  in  whose  ranks  some  candidate  was  not 
marked  out  for  that  high  office  by  current  rumor,  and 
in  some  there  were  several.  No  delegation  could  be 
sent  from  Mr.  Haven's  Conference  which  would  not  con- 
tain persons  whose  names  had  been  freely  mentioned 
in  that  honorable  connection.  It  occurred  to  some  of 
the  younger  men  of  that  body  that  New  England  was 
in  danger  of  losing  a  representative  in  the  episcopate 
through  a  multitude  of  excellent  candidates.  The  New 
England  Conference  delegation  was  likely  to  contain 
the  successful  candidate,  but  was  a  little  in  peril  of  hav- 
ing a  delegation  made  up  solely  of  episcopal  candidates. 
In  order  to  open  the  way  for  Haven's  election,  it  was 
requisite  to  give  him  a  larger  number  of  New  England 
Conference  votes  than  any  other  could  command,  and 
then  get  a  confirmation  of  his  candidacy  from  a  general 
meeting  of  the  New  England  delegations,  so  as  to  make 
him  a  prominent  nominee  at  the  very  start.  Some  meas- 
ures were  taken  to  learn  how  such  a  movement  would  be 
received,  and  the  response  was  encouraging. 

When  the  delegates  of  the  Nev/  England  Conference 
were  chosen  it  was  found  that  five  of  the  eight  minis- 


H.W'EX  IX  COXFERKXCE.  37/ 

terial  delegates  had  been  mentioned  as  candidates  for 
the  episcopacy  besides  Mr.  Haven.  The  younger  mem- 
bers of  the  delegation  favored  his  candidacy,  and  at 
the  proper  time  the  nomination  was  duly  made  at  a 
general  caucus  of  the  New  England  delegations.  This 
gave  him  a  good  send  off  in  the  canvass  that  was  going 
onward  for  eight  new  Bishops.  But  the  opposition  to 
him  was  severe,  and  the  arguments  employed  against 
him  were  of  the  strangest  sort.  He  was  regarded  seri- 
ously by  many  who  knew  him  only  in  his  writings  as 
a  visionary  fanatic,  without  the  administrative  abilities 
required  for  the  position.  He  was  deemed  too  free  and 
easy,  and  wanting  in  piety  for  a  Bishop.  The  most 
ultra  passages  from  his  books  and  sermons  on  social 
and  political  questions  were  produced  against  him.  He 

was  not  a  prudent  candidate.     Dr.    was  on  the 

floor  of  the  Conference  seeking  to  defeat  Mr.  Haven's 
election  at  the  very  moment  when  the  latter  was  vindi- 
cating his  foe  against  charges  which  seemed  to  him 
unjust,  when  every  body  knew  that  such  a  speech  was 
likely  to  cost  him  some  votes. 

Two  ballots  had  been  taken,  and  several  had  been 
elected  Bishops,  while  Haven's  vote,  though  large,  was 
yet  something  too  small  for  an  election,  when  the  Con- 
ference adjourned.  The  colored  vote  had  gone  solidly 
for  the  champion  of  equal  rights  at  every  ballot.  The 
colored  voters  used  their  influence  warmly  for  their  fa- 
vorite, and  they  held  prayer-meetings  to  see  if  they 
could  not  move  heaven  as  well  as  earth.  The  third 
ballot  was  taken  May  22,  at  the  morning  session.  Just 


3/8  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

as  Dr.  W.  F.  Mallalieu  was  entering  the  conference- 
room  one  of  the  big  black  heroes  of  the  prayer-meeting 
came  up  to  him,  with  a  face  full  of  sunshine,  saying, 

I'se  got  the  witness,  Brother  Mallalieu  ;  it's  going  to 
be  done  to-day.  We  had  a  prayer-meeting  last  night,  a 
powerful  meeting,  and  the  Lord  gave  us  the  witness 
that  Brother  Haven's  going  to  be  elected  to-day." 

The  third  ballot  was  taken.  The  total  vote  was  404, 
and  Mr.  Haven's  vote  was  209.  As  soon  as  this  result 
was  ascertained.  Dr.  Mallalieu,  who  was  teller,  signaled 
the  result  to  the  New  England  Conference  delegation 
by  some  concerted  sign,  so  that  Haven  was  aware  of  his 
election  in  ad\'ancc  of  the  official  announcement. 

The  men  who  had  labored  so  long  and  hard  for  this 
result  did  so  in  the  fixed  conviction  that  their  candidate 
would  show  himself  rarely  well  suited  to  the  general 
work  of  the  episcopate,  and  would  show  a  dignity  and 
energy  in  his  office  which  would  put  him  in  the  fore- 
front of  the  Church's  battles.  They  knew  him,  and  felt 
no  fears  concerning  his  fidelity  and  success  in  the  new 
calling.  Some  of  them  held  that  such  a  man  as  he  was 
needed  in  the  episcopal  board  to  vindicate  the  anticaste 
ideas  of  which  he  was  the  apostle. 

The  chief  value  of  the  election  in  Mr.  Haven's  eyes 
was  the  sanction  which  it  gave  to  doctrines  that  had 
been  so  dear  to  him,  and  which  he  felt  called  of 
God  to  preach  and  illustrate  in  his  new  work.  But  it 
had  another  value  for  him,  since  it  would  enable  him  to 
direct  and  elevate  public  opinion  on  these  topics  to  a 
better  and  loftier  plane.    He  had  a  secret  feeling  that 


Haven  in  Confekenxe.  3-9 

he  should  be  able  to  do  much  more  for  God  and  man. 
Yet  he  saw  that  the  episcopate  must  also  involve  no 
small  sacrifices  for  him.  His  literary  life,  with  the  leis- 
ure and  charm  of  its  pursuits,  must  mainly  be  given  up. 
This  was  a  great  sacrifice  for  him.  Then  it  would  take 
him  away  from  home,  his  mother's  home,  in  Maiden. 
The  home  circle  seemed  greatly  to  need  him.  His 
mother  was  in  her  eighty-sixth  year,  vigorous  still,  but 
likely  to  mourn  over  his  frequent  and  protracted  ab- 
sences. There  was  already  some  anxiety  about  the 
health  of  his  sister  Lizzie.  The  children  were  in  their 
teens,  and  the  care  and  responsibility  for  their  welfare 
would  fall  more  heavily  still  upon  the  other  sister,  Han- 
nah, who  had  long  been  tirelessly  watchful  for  their 
comfort  and  happiness.  Only  occasional  visits  with  the 
dear  home  circle  would  henceforth  be  possible.  This 
was  the  most  troublesome  part  of  the  new  life.  But  he 
laced  it  as  cheerfully  as  he  could.  To  a  friend  who  saw 
him  after  the  election  and  before  his  consecration,  he 
said,  "  I  have  not  sought  this  work  and  I  dare  not  de- 
cline it.  But  it  is  the  last  turn  in  my  career.  Ten,  fif- 
teen, or  tv/enty  years  of  this  work,  and  then  rest, 
heaven,  the  Saviour,  and  my  blessed  Mary  again.  How 
sweet  and  deligiitful  that  will  be  for  my  poor  heart  I  " 

Mr.  Haven  was  ordained  Bishop  in  the  Conference- 
room  on  May  25,  1872.  At  the  same  hour  were  conse- 
crated as  bishops  T.  Bowman,  W.  L.  Harris,  R.  S.  Fos- 
ter, I.  \V.  Wiley,  S.  M.  Merrill,  E.  G.  Andrews,  and  J.  T. 
Peck.  Bishop  Haven  presided  gracefully  over  one  of  the 
closing  sessions  only  of  the  General  Conference  in  1872. 


380 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  XX. 

BISHOP  HAVEN. 

Abundance  of  Information — His  Conferences— Traits  as  Presiding  Bishop — Successes  and 
Mistakes — Prejudices  against  Him — His  Preaching — At  the  Vinej'ard — His  Wit  Dreaded 
— His  Use  of  It — His  Aims  in  Correspondence  with  Papers — Oratava — Three  Sunsets — 
Accounts  of  Public  Men— Sumner — Brownlow — Brother  Tate — Rebuke  of  Popular  Sins 
—Sermon  at  V/hite  Earth — Wrongs  of  the  Indians— Their  Piety— Divorce — The  Sins  of 
the  Pacific  Coast— The  Utah  Ulcer— New  Baltimore— The  Newest  South— Sentiments 
of  Southern  Methodist  Episcopalians— A  No  Caste  Administration— Incidents— The 
Tinted  Venuses— Letter  to  the  "  Holston  Methodist  "—A  Conference  in  a  Tent— Gov- 
ernor Brown — A  Southern  Heart  Touched — Hotel  Experience — A  Conductor's  Rudeness 
— Dines  with  a  Colored  Gentleman  in  Atlanta — Echoes— The  Renomination  of  Grant — 
His  Courage,  not  Physical  but  Moral — Hotel  Proscription — Danger  of  Violence — News- 
paper Abuse — His  Confidence  in  Grant's  Statesmanship — More  Hotel  Proscription- 
Peremptory  Conductor — Distrust  of  Hayes — The  Chisholm  Funeral — The  Scene  and 
the  Preacher — Discourse — Education  in  the  South — An  Appeal — His  Interest  in  the 
Schools — Boston  University  — Will  of  Isaac  Rich  —  Trustee  of  Wesleyan  University — 
Founds  the  Mexican  Mission— Report  of  his  Mexican  Tour— Visits  Liberia — A  Kruman 
— Trees — The  Witch  Home — Witch  Detection — A  Modern  Hero — The  Negro  in  Liberia 
—  Henry — The  Conference — Comparisons  and  Questions — Missionary  Graves — Perils  in 
the  Wilderness. 

FROM  the  great  abundance  and  variety  of  informa- 
tion at  hand  concerning  the  episcopal  career  of 
Bishop  Haven  only  what  is  most  characteristic  of  the  man 
and  his  work  can  be  woven  into  this  sketch  of  his  life. 
Hundreds  of  private  letters  covering  every  part  of  his 
episcopate,  the  book  that  grew  out  of  his  visit  to  Mexico 
in  the  winter  of  1872-3,  a  long  Journal  about  his  life  on 
ship  and  sea  from  Nev/  York  to  Liberia,  another  Journal 
of  larger  dimensions  relating  to  the  rest  of  his  life  as 
Bishop,  frequent  and  long  communications  to  nearly  all 


Bishop  Haven.  381 

Methodist  Episcopal  papers  and  the  Independent,"  oc- 
casional letters  to  any  journal  he  chanced  to  encounter 
on  his  pilgrimages,  give  us  only  too-abundant  knowledge 
of  this  part  of  his  life.  The  Review  articles  he  wrote, 
the  lectures  he  delivered,  the  reports  of  sermons,  speeches, 
and  addresses  which  got  abroad  in  the  journals  add  am- 
ple gleanings  to  our  harvest.  Of  course,  this  biography 
cannot  follow  him  closely  upon  this  round  of  official  and 
extra-official  duties. 

We  must  try  to  give  some  general  notion  of  his  char- 
acteristics and  work  as  a  Bishop.  At  the  semi-annual 
meetings  of  the  episcopal  board  he  was  assigned  to  the 
presidency  of  the  following  Annual  Conferences  : 

1872,  South-west  German,  West  Wisconsin,  Min- 
nesota, Wisconsin  ;  1873,  Louisiana,  Mississippi,  Lex- 
ington, Maine,  Holston,  Tennessee,  Georgia,  Alabama  ; 

1874,  North  Carolina,  South  Carolina,  Florida,  Wyom- 
ing, Des  Moines,  Iowa,  North-west  Iowa,  Upper  Iowa ; 

1875,  New  England,  New  Hampshire,  Vermont,  East 
Maine,  Rocky  Mountains,  Colorado,  Nebraska;  1876, 
Louisiana,  Mississippi,  Philadelphia,  Liberia;  1877, 
Central  German,  Indiana,  Cincinnati,  Ohio,  South-east- 
ern Indiana;  1878,  Northern  New  York,  Troy,  Vermont, 
Central  New  York,  Genesee,  Austin,  Southern  German, 
West  Texas,  Texas;  1879,  Virginia,  New  York  East, 
Providence,  Columbia  River,  Oregon,  Southern  Califor- 
nia, California,  Nevada,  Central  Illinois. 

Of  the  fifty-four  Annual  Conferences  thus  assigned 
Bishop  Haven  during  his  episcopal  career  we  know  that 
he  did  not  attend  some.    In  the  winter  of  1872-3  he 


382  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

visited  the  new  and  promising  mission  in  Mexico,  and 
no  doubt  some  other  Bishop  must  have  taken  his  Con- 
ferences during  that  period.  Once  or  twice  he  presided 
over  Conferences  not  formally  given  into  his  care,  in 
order  to  relieve  a  sick  or  bereaved  Bishop  of  his  bur- 
dens. The  reason  he  had  so  few  Conferences  in  1876 
was  because  it  had  been  planned  that  he  should  visit 
the  Liberia  Conference  during  the  latter  half  of  that 
year.  When  circumstances  made  it  necessary  to  meet 
this  African  appointment  somewhat  later,  no  other  work 
could  be  given  to  the  incessant  laborer.  It  will  be  seen 
that  the  work  thus  committed  to  Bishop  Haven's  hands 
was  such  as  might  well  occupy  all  the  hours  and 
thoughts  of  the  most  industrious  and  vigorous  of 
men. 

It  is  known  that  the  skill  and  dignity  shown  by 
Bishop  Haven  as  a  presiding  officer  surprised  some  of 
his  closest  friends.  When  Dr.  Mallalieu  asked  him  how 
he  had  gained  his  training,  he  replied,  "  O,  I  used  to 
see  Edward  Everett  preside,  and  made  him  my  model." 
This  statement  must  not  be  taken  too  strictly,  since  he 
had  at  the  outset  no  such  acquaintance  with  parliamen- 
tary law  and  skill  in  applying  it  as  that  implies.  But 
he  had  a  strong  perception  of  the  equities  of  debate  and 
of  requirements  of  courtesy.  He  had  a  swift  skill  in 
fastening  upon  all  the  turns  of  Conference  business  and 
doing  justice  to  all  parties.  At  first  he  used  to  speak  of 
the  fact  that  he  got  through  his  work  with  very  few 
mistakes  as  the  result  of  good  luck  rather  than  skill ; 
but  gradually  he  became  quite  at  home  in  the  chair. 


Bishop  Haven.  383 

Members  of  one  of  his  latest  Conferences  spoke  with 
admiration  of  the  blended  tact,  courtesy,  and  firmness 
with  which  he  held  a  certain  difficult  business  in  its 
proper  limits,  despite  the  efforts  of  a  veteran  tactician 
to  confuse  the  Conference  and  the  chair.  Perhaps  he 
held  the  veteran  a  little  more  rigidly  to  the  letter  of  the 
law  from  a  suspicion  that  there  was  a  slight  willingness, 
afterward  confessed,  "  to  haze  a  freshman  Bishop  just  a 
little."  Yet,  from  some  slips  made  later  over  matters 
not  so  difficult,  this  conclusion  is  probably  justified  that 
Bishop  Haven  never  mastered  very  fully  the  refinemicnts 
of  ecclesiastical  and  parliamentary  law. 

He  held  that  Methodists  had  better  be  Methodists  in 
all  points.  Such  emphatic  stress  did  he  put  upon  these 
things  that  he  provoked  the  strange  criticism  that  he 
had  a  Romanist  and  hierarchical  taint  in  his  mind.  He 
was  strenuous  in  demanding  that  ministers  should  keep 
clear  of  all  entanglements  with  secular  business,  and 
should  give  themselves  only  and  wholly  to  the  work  of 
God. 

In  the  general  management  of  the  business  of  the 
Church  he  was  unusually  successful.  Generally  his 
appointments  provoked  little  criticism,  because  they 
were  made  kindly  as  well  as  wisely.  Of  the  few  cases 
where  his  appointments  awakened  open  and  public  cen- 
sure was  one  in  regard  to  which  he  had  been  very  care- 
ful and  considerate,  and  even  loving,  since  the  appointee 
was  an  old  friend.  The  censure  appeared  in  a  note  in 
the  paper  which  would  most  surely  send  it  broadcast 
among  Bishop  Haven's  old  friends,  and  yet  he  kept 


3S4  Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 

silence,  though  he  had  a  perfect  defense.  Such  things 
saddened  him,  but  left  no  bitterness  behind  in  the  few 
cases  where  they  did  happen.  He  sometimes  was  held 
to  have  made  less  successful  appointments  than  he 
might  have  done,  through  acting  too  largely  on  his  own 
uninformed  judgment,  and  sometimes  where  no  want  of 
information  could  be  claimed.  He  improved  his  only 
presidency  over  the  New  England  Conference  to  exe- 
cute a  scheme  which  he  had  long  cherished.  This  was 
to  make  Lowell  the  head  of  a  new  district.  He  fancied 
that  the  measure  would  be  readily  accepted,  would  de- 
velop a  new  enterprise  in  the  Churches  of  that  region,  and 
become  so  plain  a  success  as  to  overcome  all  opposition. 
The  writer  slept  with  Bishop  Haven  that  week  at  the 
residence  of  Rev.  William  Rice,  D.D.,  and  to  him  alone 
the  plan  was  communicated  beforehand.  To  his  very 
warm  remonstrances  about  the  unwisdom  of  the  meas- 
ure at  a  time  of  general  business  depression,  when 
heavy  church  debts  were  carried  by  many  societies, 
and  when  our  financial  work  was  a  serious  burden,  he 
answered  that  his  only  chance  to  do  the  work  was  at 
that  session,  and  that  success  would  crown  his  bold 
measure.  He  could  not  be  induced  to  consult  Dr.  Rice, 
whose  perfect  knowledge  of  the  ground  and  sobriety  of 
judgment  made  him  a  wise  adviser,  nor  did  he  consult 
his  official  advisers.  The  measure  was  so  instantly  and 
unreservedly  condemned  that  the  new  district,  after  a 
year's  uneasy  life,  disappeared.  There  is  no  doubt  that 
his  ardent  conviction  as  to  the  possibilities  in  any  given 
case  sometimes  led  him  into  mistakes  of  this  sort.  But 


Bishop  Havex.  385 

this  did  not  happen  very  often,  while  usually  the  results 
justified  his  expectations.  Speaking  in  general  terms, 
his  entire  episcopal  work  may  be  pronounced  successful. 
It  was  found  that  many  of  his  rash-seeming  schemes 
had  a  good  sense  at  their  basis  which  justified  his 
courage. 

Bishop  Haven  had  certain  prejudices  and  doubts  to 
overcome  in  the  general  opinion  of  the  Church,  and  even 
on  the  part  of  some  of  his  colleagues.  Some  doubted 
whether  the  episcopal  dignity  was  quite  safe  in  his 
hands.  Such  people  lost  their  doubts  as  they  saw  the 
gravity  with  which  he  executed  the  public  duties  of  his 
calling.  They  found  that  he  was  one  of  the  last  persons 
to  be  trifled  with  in  such  matters. 

Concerning  Bishop  Haven's  preaching  in  the  closing 
years  something  should  be  said.  It  had  the  same  general 
characteristics  that  it  showed  when  he  was  in  the  pastor- 
ate. Most  of  the  sermons  he  speaks  of  preaching  in  his 
official  rounds  of  duty  are  the  same  he  used  to  preach  as 
pastor.  The  sermons,  no  doubt,  were  far  enough  from 
being  the  same.  The  preparation  for  preaching  was 
still  the  same  outline  that  he  had  formerly  employed, 
but  it  was  subjected  to  a  great  deal  of  modification  and 
improvement  in  delivery.  The  sermon  usually  became 
simpler  in  plan  but  richer  in  argument  and  illustration. 
Much  reference  to  scenes  the  preacher  had  passed  through 
and  to  current  events  was  sure  to  appear.  It  is  certain 
that  these  old-new  sermons  were  among  the  most 
effective  he  delivered.     The  new  sermons  which  he 

wrought  out  were  usually  prepared  with  more  leisure 
17  ^ 


386 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


and  care  than  the  others.  Some  that  we  heard  seemed 
to  be  as  good  examples  of  pulpit  discourse  as  are  often 
heard  in  the  best  pulpits  of  our  time. 

Great  as  was  the  improvement  in  the  general  sub- 
stance of  his  preaching,  there  was  perhaps  a  greater 
one  in  his  style  of  delivery.  He  was  uniformly  cool, 
self-poised,  and  easy  in  bearing.  His  voice  was  pleas- 
ant and  natural  and  adapted  to  its  matter.  He  liked 
to  say  his  most  daring  things  in  a  quiet,  careless  way, 
which  greatly  heightened  their  impressiveness.  Bishop 
Janes  heard  him  preach  and  speak  a  few  times  after  his 
election  to  the  episcopate,  and  spoke  in  the  highest 
terms  of  his  effectiveness  in  such  work.  His  gifts  were 
all  softened  and  mellowed  with  age. 

Rev.  V.  A.  Cooper  gives  the  following  account  of  a 
sermon  delivered  at  Martha's  Vineyard,  in  August,  1874, 
on  the  camp  ground  : 

A  few  years  since  Martha's  Vineyard  was  visited  by  General  and 
Mrs.  Grant.  Bishop  Haven  preached  on  Sunday,  and  preached  a  great 
sermon  to  the  unsaved.  The  truth  was  hot,  pungent,  convincing, 
convicting.  At  the  close  of  the  sermon  he  invited  sinners  to  the 
altar,  and  amid  weeping  they  came  from  many  parts  of  that  great 
congregation  of  at  least  ten  thousand  people.  Men  of  less  faith 
were  anxious  about  the  general,  how  he  would  take  it.  Mrs.  Grant 
was  in  tears.  The  Bishop  went  down  into  the  straw  to  point  sin- 
ners to  Christ.  The  President's  wife  was  on  her  knees,  her  husband 
sat  with  folded  arms  looking  down  upon  the  scene.  One  of  the 
polite  managers  asked  him  if  he  did  not  wish  to  retire  from  the 
stand.  Said  Grant,  "No,  I  propose  to  stay  and  see  this  thing  out." 
And  he  did.  Victory  turned  on  Zion's  side ;  amid  the  shouts  of 
many  redeemed  souls,  the  meeting  closed. 


Bishop  Haven.  3S7 

The  Bishop's  text  on  that  great  day  was  one  on 
which  we  have  several  times  heard  him  preach,  "  Multi- 
tudes, multitudes  in  the  valley  of  decision."  Joel  iii,  14. 
It  was  in  itself  no  better  and  no  worse  than  many  such 
camp- meeting  discourses  he  has  preached  all  over  New 
England  ;  though  he  was  probably  stirred  up  over  the 
multitudes  he  had  to  preach  to  and  answer  for.  His 
sermon  was  also  hot  with  prayer,  and  quick  with  the 
Spirit's  power.  The  Journal  only  says,  "I  tried  to  be 
faithful." 

He  was  not  always  prudent,  even  when  he  meant  to  be, 
in  his  pulpit  labors.  When  he  had  resolved  not  to  preach 
more  than  once  a  Sunday  he  was  sometimes  beguiled 
into  a  little  talk,  "  not  a  sermon  at  all,  but  just  a  little 
bit  of  a  talk."  But  the  talk  often  grew  to  greater  length 
than  a  sermon  should  have.  After  he  had  preached  a 
morning  sermon  in  one  church  at  a  certain  Western  city 
his  talk  at  the  other  church  in  the  afternoon,  very  bright, 
sharp,  and  eloquent,  was  at  least  twice  as  long  as  the 
sermon.  One  of  his  auditors  said  to  him  :  "  Your  talk, 
Bishop,  reminds  me  of  a  certain  stor>^  An  Irishman 
went  to  a  menagerie.  Pat  was  shown  all  sorts  of  beasts, 
and  with  the  rest  a  great  Anierican  moose. 

'And  is  that  an  American  moose  ? '  he  asked. 

"  *  Yes,  Pat,  that  is  a  great  American  moose.' 
*  Wull,  if  that  is  the  American  moose,  plaze  show 
me  an  American  rat.'  " 

There  was  a  vague  fear  in  many  minds  that  Bishop 
Haven  would  continue  the  intimacies  with  reformers  of 
all  stripes  which  Gilbert  Haven  had  begun.    This  he 


383  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

did,  and  yet  neither  the  reformers  nor  the  bishopric 
seemed  any  the  worse  for  it.  He  presided  at  reform 
conventions  of  various  kinds,  and  spoke  in  the  interest 
of  all  the  causes  he  loved  without  bringing  on  any  great 
public  convulsion.  Some  people  hinted  in  the  papers 
that  a  Bishop  ought  to  be  more  circumspect,  but  such 
suggestions  were  all  wasted  on  him.  Some  people 
hoped  and  some  feared  that  his  new  office  would  make 
him  more  conservative,  as  official  duty  is  supposed  to 
do,  but  all  were  soon  undeceived  in  reference  to  their 
foolish  apprehensions. 

M.  Guizot  tells  us  that  Sidney  Smith's  wit  had  a 
share,  perhaps,  in  keeping  the  episcopal  miter  from  his 
brow,  and  remarks  on  the  shock  which  all  decent  En- 
glishmen would  have  felt  at  seeing  the  reverend  wag 
in  lawn  sleeves.  Many  Americans  shared  this  notion 
in  respect  to  Bishop  Haven,  and  some  hinted  their  be- 
lief, it  could  hardly  be  called  hope,  that  now,  at  least,  he 
would  restrain  his  overflowing  mirth  within  narrower 
bounds.  But  Gilbert  Haven  was  himself  in  his  new 
relations.  His  fun  was  sometimes  used  to  protect  his 
official  dignity.  The  newspapers  spoke  of  him  as  though 
any  body  might  salute  him  as  Gil  Haven  or  Bishop 
Gil  Haven,  a  privilege  which  was  confined  to  a  very  few 
old  familiars.  Soon  after  his  election  a  reception  was 
tendered  to  the  Bishops  at  some  private  residence. 
During  the  evening  a  lady  cried  out,  rather  too  loudly: 

Ah,  Bishop  Gil,  I  am  glad  to  oce  you.  How's  your 
health.  Bishop  Gil?" 

First  rate,  thank  you,  Sal.    How's  Clint?"  was  the 


Bishop  Haven.  389 

pat  rejoinder.  It  is  believed  that  this  perilous  experi- 
ment was  never  repeated. 

At  a  reception  tendered  a  little  later  to  Bishop  Wiley, 
at  Horticultural  Hall,  in  Boston,  Bishop  Haven  chanced 
to  enter  the  room  at  a  late  hour  and  unexpectedly. 
Some  people  saw  him  and  began  to  call  out  in  a  pause 
of  the  proceedings,  Haven,  Haven,  Haven !  "  while 
some  cried,  "  Gil  Haven,  Gil  Haven  !  "  The  demand  was 
so  vociferous  that  the  managers  were  obliged  to  sum- 
mon him  forward  to  satisfy  it.  As  he  stepped  to  the 
platform  the  cries  were  renewed  and  redoubled.  When 
quiet  was  again  secured  Bishop  Haven  told  them  the 
following  story : 

During  the  late  unpleasantness  a  boy  enlisted  as  a 
common  soldier.  When  he  went  away  from  home  the 
village  folks  touched  their  hats  respectfully  and  said, 
*  Good-bye,  Jim.'  As  the  war  went  on  the  volunteer  rose 
from  grade  to  grade  until  he  became  a  general.  Hav- 
ing had  no  respite  till  then,  he  resolved  to  get  leave  of 
absence  to  go  and  see  the  old  folks  at  home.  He  packed 
up,  after  his  furlough  came,  and  just  as  he  was  starting 
his  comrades  took  off  their  hats  and  bowed,  saying,  'A 
pleasant  journey  to  you,  general.'  When  he  had  gone 
on  some  days'  journey  further  he  encountered  some  for- 
mer companions  in  arms,  who  touched  their  hats  and 
said,  *A  pleasant  journey  to  you,  colonel.'  Further  on 
the  salutation  came,  '  A  pleasant  journey  to  you,  cap- 
tain.' But  one  fine  morning,  as  he  was  alighting  from 
the  train  in  a  little  village,  the  people  cried  out,  '  Hullo, 
Jim,  how  are  you  ?  '  " 


390  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

At  this  point  the  laughter  and  shouting  broke  out  so 
violently  that  the  tired  Bishop  sat  down  without  finish- 
ing the  story. 

On  one  occasion  he  sat  in  the  recess  of  the  pulpit  in 
a  church  where  Bishop  Peck  was  holding  one  of  the 
colored  Conferences,  arranging  in  whispers  some  imper- 
ative business  with  Mr.  Phillips,  one  of  the  Agents  of 
the  Book  Concern.  Bishop  Peck  had  a  great  deal  to 
say  to  the  Conference  about  the  necessity  of  quiet  and 
good  order  in  doing  their  business.  After  Conference 
had  adjourned  for  the  day.  Bishop  Peck  said  to  Brother 
Phillips,  You  and  Bishop  Haven  disturbed  me  very 
much  this  morning  by  your  whisperings." 

Did  we,"  said  the  courteous  agent,  "  why  didn't  you 
send  me  word  ?  I  would  have  kept  as  still  as  a  mouse 
if  I  had  suspected  we  were  troubling  you." 

Pretty  soon  Bishop  Haven  came  up,  and  Mr.  Phillips 
asked  him,  Did  you  know  that  Bishop  Peck  was  talk- 
ing at  us  this  morning  when  he  was  lecturing  the  Con- 
ference about  quietness?" 

"  O  yes  ;  I  saw  that  he  meant  to  touch  us  up  full  as 
much  as  he  did  them." 

"But  why  didn't  you  tell  me  ?  I  would  have  been  as 
dumb  as  the  tomb." 

''Well,  Brother  Phillips,  they  are  used  to  it.  It  isn't 
the  first  time  niggers  have  been  whipped  for  white  men." 

On  occasion  of  the  Bishops'  Meeting  in  Baltimore, 
Bishop  Ames  had  introduced  B'shop  Peck,  the  last 
elected  of  the  Bishops,  though  not  the  least  in  weight, 
as  the  dabj'  of  the  episcopate.    The  opening  remarks  of 


Bishop  Haven.  391 

the  responding  officer  showed  that  he  did  not  quite 
rehsh  the  jest,  when  suddenly  the  company  was  con- 
vulsed with  merriment  over  Bishop  Haven's  whispered 
comment,     Bishop  Ames,  the  baby  is  crying!  " 

Putting  down  a  few  such  hits  as  these  gives  no  notion 
of  the  sudden  electric  effect  which  these  witticisms  pro- 
duced as  they  leaped  from  the  living  Hps.  They  were 
sometimes  used  to  parry  the  strokes  of  opponents 
in  rapid  debate.  A  minister  once  cited  a  remark  of 
Cicero's  to  prop  up  some  position  he  had  taken.  Give 
us  the  Latin  original,  brother,  and  perhaps  I  shall  un- 
derstand that  better  than  the  translation,"  said  the  wag 
with  a  comically  desperate  look  of  perplexity  clouding 
his  face. 

He  was  introduced  to  the  editor  of  a  Southern  Meth- 
odist paper,  who  had  not  spared  the  Bishop  in  various 
articles  where  he  had.  taken  occasion  to  discuss  his  do- 
ings in  the  South.  Before  they  parted  the  editor  hinted 
at  an  explanation,  if  not  an  apology,  for  his  course  by 
saying,  Well,  Bishop  Haven,  I  belong  to  the  Church 
militant." 

"  I  to  the  Church  triumphant,"  said  the  militant 
Bishop. 

These  traits  made  him  widely  known  in  ways  which 
were  not  always  best  nor  suited  to  convey  a  correct 
notion  of  the  real  man.  That  he  had  nobler  and  holier 
characteristics  was  not  so  clear  to  people  who  only  knew 
him  in  this  fugitive  and  superficial  way.  But  a  bishop 
of  any  Church  must  be  steadily  doing  high  and  serious 
work  in  the  religious  realm  in  order  to  real  succe  s. 


392 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Bishop  Haven's  work  as  a  bishop  has  certain  character- 
istics which  give  it  personal  distinctiveness. 

One  peculiarity  of  Bishop  Haven's  episcopal  activity 
was  the  free  way  in  w^hich  he  took  the  readers  of  the 
Church  papers  along  with  him  on  his  various  episcopal 
tours.  If  one  wishes  to  gain  a  full  conception  of  the  im- 
pressions made  upon  his  mind  by  his  episcopal  tours  he 
should  take  the  Hst  of  his  Annual  Conferences  each 
year,  and  then  read  the  letters  dispatched  to  the  various 
papers  for  which  he  wrote.  The  letters  disclose  a  sharp 
eye  for  all  sorts  of  interesting  objects  within  the  special 
region  visited,  an  eager  appreciation  of  the  social  and 
religious  changes  going  forward,  and  a  sure  perception 
of  the  faults  and  virtues  of  the  communities  he  saw. 
That  nobody  may  be  mistaken  as  to  the  spirit  and  pur- 
pose of  his  notes  of  travel,  he  tells  us  what  their  charac- 
ter and  aim  are  : 

At  the  beginning  of  these  occasional  notes  I  beg  leave  to  say  that 
I  shall  have  nothing  to  say,  as  I  have  said  nothing,  of  any  thing  or 
any  body,  except  what  is  true  and  kindly.  With  good-will  toward 
all  and  malice  toward  none,  I  shall  do  as  I  have  done,  scribble  of 
that  which  comes  under  my  own  eye,  in  my  own  work  and  wander- 
ings. A  class  of  views  th^^t  will  not  include  places,  parties,  and 
peoples  with  whom  I  am  not  acquainted.  I  shall  note  and  commend 
our  own  work  and  men,  believing  that  he  is  a  successful  merchant 
who  praises  and  pushes  his  own  goods.  "  Mind  your  own  business  " 
is  a  good  motto  for  all  Churches  as  well  as  all  persons.  That  has 
been  sought  in  this  correspondence,  that  will  be  its  continual  aim. 

Other  Bishops  had  done  the  Church  the  service  of 
giving  a  general  view  of  distant  lands,  and  the  religious 


Bishop  Haven.  393 

missions  carried  on  in  them.  Bishop  Haven  was  the 
first  who  acted  on  the  conviction  that  the  different  parts 
of  our  vast  republic  are  quite  too  Httle  known  to  each 
other.  He  thought  it  would  be  just  as  pleasant  and 
more  profitable  for  people  to  peruse  pictures  of  home 
travel  in  a  land  where  home  extends  frorn  the  gulf  to 
the  lakes,  and  from  ocean  to  ocean. 

Accordingly  he  threw  off  hurried  notes  of  travel  for 
the  papers  wherever  he  journeyed.  He  paints  "An 
American  Venice  "  on  the  Chesapeake  ;  shows  the  glow- 
ing lights  which  brighten  and  die  on  lake  and  mountain ; 
photographs  Western  cities,  towns,  rivers,  and  prairies  ; 
depicts  the  beauty  and  delights  of  Southern  landscapes ; 
exhibits  New  Orleans  under  the  blaze  of  midsummer 
and  the  softened  radiance  of  midwinter.  He  portrays 
Los  Angeles  as  the  American  Damascus  "  in  such  ef- 
fective colors  that  the  local  paper  reprints  the  portrayal 
and  sends  it  far  and  wide  as  a  worthy  picture.  Each 
landscape  has  its  own  special  character  caught  and  fixed 
forever  in  his  swift  words.  To  see  the  value  of  this 
gift  we  simply  produce  his  account,  abridged  some- 
what, of  the  Valley  of  Oratava,  which  startled  his  im- 
agination even  more  than  the  peak  of  Teneriffe  soaring 
above  it : 

The  scenery  grows  softer  and  richer  as  we  come  over  the  side  of 

the  upland.  The  sea  lies  before  us  on  one  side,  the  high  uncultivated, 

uncultivable  mountain   ranges  on  the  other.     Between  descend 

the  valleys,  rich  with  vineyards,  cochineal  plantations,  and  other 

tropical  fullness.    The  trees  that  line  the  roadside  are  full  of  white 

blossoms.     We  wind  around  a  deep  barranca,  down  and  up  its 

steep  sides.    Beyond  the  village  of  St.  Ursula  was  passed,  a  sharp 
17* 


394 


Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 


turn  was  made  in  the  descending  road,  and  the  Valley  of  Oratava 
lay  wonderful  beneath  us.  .  .  .  This  is  the  spot,  we  were  told,  where 
Humboldt  Tell  on  his  knees  and  thanked  God  that  he  had  been  per- 
mitted to  see  the  Valley  of  Oratava.  We  ought  to  have  followed 
his  example,  and  did  so  in  our  hearts,  if  not  with  our  knees  and  Hps- 
How  foolish  to  essay  description !  Yet  for  what  other  purpose  have 
we  led  you  so  far  ?  You  few  who  have  patiently  followed  us  thither 
stand  here  and  see.  Your  road  hugs  the  side  of  the  mountain  whose 
ridgy  back  is  the  eastern  wall  of  the  valley.  The  opposite  wall  is 
fifteen  miles  away,  and  rises  straight  up  from  the  ocean  to  the  dome 
of  the  mountain,  a  w^all  not  less  than  three  thousand  feet  above  the 
slope  of  the  valley  from  its  beginning  near  the  sea  to  its  termination 
on  the  shoulder  of  the  mountain,  on  which  rests  and  from  which  rises 
the  symmetric,  majestic,  mighty  dome.  The  rear  wall  of  the  valley  is  a 
hke  cliff  of  rock,  that  goes  out  straight  from  that  shoulder  at  right 
angles  to  the  ridge,  descending  to  the  ocean,  until  it  meets  the  wall, 
down  whose  side  your  road  descends.  The  valley  begins  two  to 
four  thousand  feet  below  that  wall,  and  descends  by  an  easy  grade 
to  the  sea.  You  have,  therefore,  a  valley  on  the  side  of  the  mount- 
ain, inclosed  by  three  gigantic  walls,  two  of  them  so  sharp  and 
steep  as  to  be  practically  unscalable.  The  other  admitting  of  a 
roadway,  and  not  much  more,  on  its  side,  with  the  ocean  at  the  bot- 
tom, parallel  to  the  back  ridge  and  the  vast  dome,  rising  four  thou- 
sand feet  above  the  uppermost  line  of  the  wall,  black  with  ravines 
and  precipices,  white  with  snow,  glittering  with  ice.  The  whole 
scene  a  bowl  filled  to  the  overflowing  of  its  rims,  and  even  the  gigan- 
tic knob  that  crowned  it,  with  the  blaze  of  a  tropic  midnoon. 

But  this  cold  outline  only  gives  you  half  the  picture.  The  mount- 
ain walls  and  the  valley  itself  are  a  wonderful  freak  of  nature.  But 
so  is  the  3fer  de  Glace,  and  many  another  granite  wall  inclosing  a 
vale  of  ice.  This  valley  is  the  center  of  beauty,  if  the  mountain  is 
the  point  of  sublimity.  Such  a  landscape  I  never  saw  before  and 
never  expect  to  see  again.  Every  inch  of  this  space,  of  fifteen  miles 
wide  by  ten  miles  from  the  ocean  upward,  was  clad  in  tropical  per- 
fection.   Not  perfection  of  wildne  s,  but  of  culture.    On  your  right. 


Bishop  Havex. 


395 


as  you  descend  the  mountain  and  slide  gracefully  and  slowly  down 
to  the  sea,  sweeps  the  most  exquisite  picture  eye  ever  saw  that  never 
saw  Damascus,  and  to  that  I  will  not  surrender.  Vineyards  inclosed 
with  walls,  fields  of  wheat  and  lupin,  cochineal,  and  other  fields,  po- 
tatoes and  common  edibles  mingling  with  rarer  productions.  We 
dismounted  and  walked  down  the  hill.  Far  away  for  the  whole 
breadth  of  fifteen  miles,  far  up  to  the  edge  of  the  great  brown  wall, 
lay  cultured  fertility.  Fields  mapped  with  careful  lines  of  walls  or 
hedge,  black  with  the  plow  already  at  work,  green  with  rising  grains, 
brown  with  grape-stalks.  Every-where  humanity  trampling  over 
nature.  Clusters  of  white  appeared  here  and  there,  towers  of 
churches  among  them.  Three  towns  are  on  the  slope,  one  at  the 
sea.  Oratava,  the  chief,  lies  half  way  down  the  slope,  and  also  at 
the  sea.  All  over  the  broad  incline  are  scattered  villas  and  cottages. 
The  cheapest  and  poorest  seem  clad  with  a  beauty  not  their  own 
by  the  richness  of  their  surroundings.  To  add  to  this  richness, 
flowers  of  strange  and  familiar  aspects  (familiar,  however,  only  in 
hot-houses  or  July  heats)  lined  the  roadsides  and  appeared  in  the 
courts  of  the  houses.  Such  large  and  rich-toned  geraniums  are 
never  seen  in  an  American  hot-house.  They  grow  profusely  in  the 
gardens  and  almost  wildly  by  the  roadside.  So  do  the  nasturtiums, 
the  periwinkles,  a  pretty  blue  star,  the  plumbago,  smaller  or  in 
bunches  or  tall  bushes,  cineraria,  wild  roses.  A  deep  magenta 
flower,  more  magnificent'  than  all  the  others,  was  running  over  a 
veranda  in  great  profusion,  and  a  rich  orange  flower  shared  half 
the  same  veranda.  One  cannot  get  over  the  bewilderment  of  this 
luxurious  and  abundant  life.  It  grew  at  every  advance  into  its 
heart. 

The  dragon-tree  and  the  cork-tree  added  their  novelties.  So,  by 
violent  contrast,  did  an  immense  dome,  five  hundred  feet  high,  which 
is  only  an  ash-heap.  Cinders  were  the  whole  of  it.  Not  a  tree, 
hardly  a  green  blade  was  upon  it.  The  latter  had  made  out  to  get 
soil  enough  together  to  struggle  feebly  into  life.  At  the  summit  a 
like  mound  had  been  pointed  out,  which  had  no  stone  in  it.  It  has 
been  dug  up  to  the  depth  of  twenty  feet,  and  never  a  rock,  a  stone, 


39^ 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


a  pebble.  A  thousand  feet  high  of  rockless  earth  !  It  was  covered 
with  trees,  gardens,  grass-life,  to  and.  over  its  smooth  dome.  So 
nature  contrasts  with  herself. 

Of  course  Mr.  Haven  did  not  have  such  a  landscape 
to  depict  very  often.  But  his  account  of  Teneriffe  itself 
is  hardly  less  effective  than  this  picture  of  the  valley 
beside  it.  Very  life-like  are  the  sketches  of  Los  An- 
geles, the  Yo  Semite,  and  Another  Amenia.  But  this 
swift  eye  for  the  picturesque  brings  a  good  store  of 
pleasant  reading  into  his  most  ordinary  correspondence. 
Even  from  that  book  on  Mexico,  which  the  critics  han- 
dled so  severely,  one  may  select  many  pictures  which 
those  critics  never  approached,  as  this  one  seen  near 
Monterey : 

A  single  rosy  ray  streamed  up  from  behind  the  easternmost 
mountain  like  a  finger,  an  index  of  the  coming  sun.  Homer's  figure 
which  Milton  appropriates,  as  he  does  so  much  of  Homer's, 

"  The  rosy-fingered  dawn  appears," 

was  suggested  to  my  mind  by  this  unusual  spectacle.  Anon  a  sec- 
ond broad  ray  joined  its  fellow,  two  fingers  uplifted  by  the  coming 
sun.  The  rosy  light,  soon  changed  to  yellow,  shone  through  the 
openings  of  the  hills,  and  sent  its  luster  across  the  lovely  plain  and 
upon  the  high  and  gracefully  molded  mountains  which  shut  that  in. 
The  richer  line  of  Tennyson  expressed  the  glory  that  followed  : 

"The  rosy  thrones  of  dawn." 

Contrast  with  this  two  tropical  sunsets  sketched  on 
his  passage  to  Liberia  : 

Some  of  these  sunsets  are  as  perfect  as  any  ever  gotten  up  in 
Italy.  A  week  ago  we  leaned  over  the  monkey  rail,  gazing  upon  a 
matchless  picture.    The  blaze  shot  up  into  some  of  the  cloud  masses 


Bishop  Haven. 


397 


piled  above.  Banks  of  velvet  lay  along  either  side,  a  base  for  the 
hues  adjusted  above  it.  Black  clouds  turned  to  rose,  saffron,  and 
blue ;  so  delicate  as  almost  to  cease  to  be  color,  and  so  definite  as 
to  be  positive  and  clear  in  tone,  touched  at  their  intersection  into  an 
exquisite  green.  Unlike  northern  sunsets  these  masses  and  touches 
of  color  do  not  gather  alone  about  the  sun  itself;  they  spread  around 
the  whole  horizon.  The  east  was  tinted  with  rose,  and  the  heavens 
suffused  with  color.  It  was  warm,  soft,  and  delicate,  a  perfect  pict- 
ure. Wordsworth's  pen  or  Turner's  pencil  would  utterly  fail  in 
giving  the  outer  garment  of  this  innermost  glory.  Yet  an  hour  or 
less  exhausted  it  all.  No  twilight  lingers  around  the  dying  bed  of 
day.  Like  the  dolphin,  it  died  in  wonderful  brilliancy,  but  it  died  sud- 
denly.   A  dark  pall  quickly  covered  the  corpse  of  the  dead  day.  .  .  . 

Last  night  another  sort  of  sunset  occurred.  It  was  simple 
and  astonishingly  effective.  Could  an  artist  catch  its  tone  he 
could  make  a  hall  superb  with  two  colors  alone.  From  the  un- 
seen sun  shot  up  masses  of  gold,  each  a  segment  of  a  sphere. 
Between  these  glowing  curtains  hung  narrow  strips  of  blue.  The 
blue  might  have  been  a  tenth  of  the  width  of  the  gold.  This  blue 
strip  was  a  rivulet  of  plain,  honest  sky,  running  down  to  the  sea, 
between  broad  bands  of  yellow  haze.  The  golden  blaze  suffusing 
the  misty  segment,  contrasting  with  the  tender  azure,  was  perfect 
for  contrast  and  combination.  Looking  at  it  one  said  it  seemed  to 
fit  perfectly  Charles  Wesley's  grand  line  : 

"  Loose  all  your  bars  of  massy  light." 

Another  interesting  feature  of  Mr.  Haven's  public 
correspondence  is  the  accounts  of  conspicuous  public 
men  that  constantly  glide  through  it.  He  knows  so 
many  interesting  people,  and  gets  acquainted  so  readily, 
that  one  way  and  another  he  has  something  worth  tell- 
ing to  say  of  them  all.  Parson  Brownlow,  General  Ros- 
encrans,  Charles  Sumner,  Henry  Wilson,  General  Grant, 


398  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

General  Butler,  Bishop  Ames,  "  Warrington,"  Emerson, 
Garrison,  Phillips,  and  Sherman  are  some  of  the  men 
whom  one  meets  in  these  lively  pages.  It  is  true  that 
his  relations  with  most  of  these  persons  is  only  moment- 
ary, but  he  has  the  swift  sense  of  what  is  characteristic 
which  fastens  upon  and  fixes  instantly  what  is  precious. 
He  has  points  of  sympathy  with  all  sorts  of  men.  Mr. 
Sumner  showed  him  all  his  literary  treasures  and  rari- 
ties. His  profound  admiration  for  Mr.  Sumner's  char- 
acter and  public  services  does  not  in  the  least  blind  him 
to  his  faults,  mistakes,  and  seeming  willfulness.  He 
knew  how  to  maintain  an  independent  bearing  toward 
all  such  men.  Grant  asked  him  what  cure  there  was  for 
the  southern  anarchy.  Territorial  governments  "  was 
the  immediate  reply.  So  he  is  very  definite  in  his  no- 
tions concerning  the  faults  of  Bishop  Ames,  Garrison, 
Butler,  and  Wilson.  He  defended  Protestantism  against 
Rosencrans,  whom  he  found  well  furnished  with  the  best 
weapons,  offensive  and  defensive,  of  modern  Catholicism. 

The  following  quotation  from  his  private  Journal  shows 
how  coolly  he  could  do  justice  to  distinguished  contem- 
poraries : 

Went  to  Washington,  called  on  Mr.  Sumner,  spent  two  hours  with 
him  trying  to  keep  him  from  going  over  to  the  enemy.  He  received 
me  very  cordiaHfT and  was  very  free  in  his  conversation.  He  hates 
Grant  so  that  he  fears  terrible  things  if  he  continues  in  the  govern- 
ment. He  quoted  a  Latin  writer  as  saying  of  some  one's  government 
that  it  was  "  crass."  "  This  is  crasser,  crassest  !  "  he  exclaimed- 
He  said  that  his  San  Domingo  speech  had  not  a  word  against  Grant 
which  Mrs.  Grant  could  have  objected  to  ;  yet  after  he  had  defeated 
the  treaty,  as  he  affirmed  he  did,  Chandler  went  reeling  into  the 


Bishop  Haven. 


399 


presence  of  Grant,  and  said,  "Sumner  has  killed  the  treaty.  You 
must  strike  him  through  his  appointments,  and  the  best  place  to  hit 
him  is  by  cutting  off  the  head  of  that  English  snob  who  parts  his 
hair  in  the  middle.  You  and  I  don't  part  our  hair  there."  Then  he 
removed  Motley. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  Grant  acted  in  an  ugly  manner  and  in  a 
bad  spirit,  but  it  is  also  possible  that  Motley  did  not  properly  treat 
our  own  people,  or  represent  our  nation  in  its  democratic  qualities. 
.  .  .  Sumner  impeached  Grant's  capacity.  "  He  don't  know  any 
thing.  He  will  sit  all  night  smoking  and  drinking."  At  a  dinner 
party  that  sat  down  at  six,  Grant  was  present,  and  they  sat  till  ten. 
He  got  tired,  waited  for  the  President  to  break  up  the  party,  but  he 
sat  and  smoked.  "At  last,"  said  Sumner,  "I  got  up.  I  couldn't 
stand  it  any  longer.  As  I  entered  the  drawing-room.  Chief  Justice 
Chase  and  the  British  minister  entered  it  also,  having  followed  my 
example.  He  is  the  most  ignorant  man  in  the  country.  He  knows 
so  little  of  public  affairs  that  I  should  get  a  better  answer  if  I  should 
go  into  the  streets  and  say  to  the  first  man  I  met,  '  I  beg  your  par- 
don, sir ;  I  have  not  the  honor  of  your  acquaintance,  but  I  have  a 
point  relating  to  the  Geneva  Arbitration  which  I  wish  to  submit  to 
your  consideration.'" 

But,  I  suggested,  it  is  not  General  Grant's  business  to  know  the 
Geneva  question  especially.  That  belongs  to  the  Secretary  of  State, 
"He  don't  know  as  much  as  the  President."  As  he  had  just  said. 
Grant  is  the  most  ignorant  man  in  the  countr}-,  he  could  hardly  get 
Fish  ahead  in  that  line.  Yet  his  rage  at  Fish  is  greater  than  at  Grant. 
He  rose  up  in  his  remarks,  spoke  in  his  deepest,  richest  tones, 
gesticulated  violently,  and  looked  as  magnificent  in  his  wrath  as 
Achilles  doubtless  did  in  his.  Governor  Cummings,  of  Pennsylvania, 
was  filling  his  ears  with  deceptive  words  about  the  success  of  the 
new  movement.  I  expressed  my  doubts.  "  You  are  the  first  man 
who  has  expressed  a  doubt  to  me,  except  Henry  Wilson."  So  com.- 
pletely  was  he  befooled. 

I  entreated  him  not  to  go,  for  the  sake  of  the  principles  he  had 
espoused  his  Hfe  long.    He  said  Grant  and  Fish  hated  the  negro.  I 


400 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


claimed  that  Grant  harl  g-iven  them  their  rights  and  protected  them 
better  than  any  one.  I  said  his  election  was  only  for  four  years  and 
he  could  do  no  harm.  He  said  Grant  would  undertake  to  annex 
San  Domingo.  I  contended  that  the  annexation  of  San  Domingo 
was  wise.  It  would  carr>'  out  the  principle  of  no  distinction  on 
account  of  color.  It  would  put  two  senators  of  African  descent  in 
the  Senate,  and  when  Hayti  was  annexed  four.  He  said  he  had 
not  raised  his  objections  against  the  annexation,  but  its  method. 
I  said  I  did  not  approve  of  the  mode,  but  of  the  fact.  As  I  rose  to 
leave  he  rose  and  began  a  new  flood  of  invective  against  Grant. 

I  left  him  regretfully  and  look  upon  him  as  ruined  politically,  all 
through  spite.  The  trouble  goes  back  far.  I  think  it  goes  back  to 
his  not  being  invited  to  be  Secretar}-  of  State.  As  head  of  For- 
eign Affairs  in  the  Senate,  through  the  terms  of  Lincoln  and  John- 
son, he  came  to  look  on  himself  as  the  regular  successor  of  Seward. 
He  was  not  taken.  He  struck  Grant  before  he  was  fairly  sworn  in 
by  preventing  Stewart's  confirmation.  Motley  was  given  him,  though 
Fish  desired  Jay,  and  so  the  quarrel  has  grown. 

Yet  when  the  noble  Senator  was  dead  Haven  entered  in 
his  Journal  words  of  profound  sorrow  over  his  departure, 
doing  no  niggard  justice  to  his  splendid  endowments  and 
wonderful  achievement,  and  praising  especially  his  unfal- 
tering fidelity  to  all  the  claims  of  duty  in  the  interest  of 
the  oppressed.  He  also  regretted  that  Grant  could  not 
have  been  wise  and  fortunate  enough  to  have  this  pur- 
est of  contemporary  statesmen  for  his  Secretary  of  State. 

How  graphic  are  his  portraits  of  Senator  Brownlow 
and  Brother  Tate  : 

senator  brownlow. 

You  see  a  long,  thin,  pale  face  joined  to  a  long,  thin  body  with 
long,  thin  hands  that  shake  incessantly.  The  face  is  smooth  and 
even  child-like  in  its  looks,  while  the  eye  is  as  bright  as  the  light. 


Bishop  Haven. 


401 


The  face,  form,  eye,  and  shaking  hands  belong  to  Senator  Brownlow, 
the  greatest  man  of  Tennessee  since  Andrew  Jackson,  and  not  a 
whit  behind  that  chiefest  of  Tennesseeans.  He  got  his  "shakes" 
in  a  dingy  stone  house  at  Nashville,  that  stands  back  from  the  street 
on  the  chief  residence  avenue,  an  old-fashioned  jail  where  his  rebel 
friends  confined  him  in  such  a  state  of  the  weather,  and  with  such 
associated  cruelties  as  brought  on  this  shaking  palsy,  from  which  for 
ten  years  he  has  ceaslessly  suffered.  But  he  has  made  them  shake 
inwardly  worse  than  he  shakes  outwardly,  and  he  makes  them  shake 
still.  He  is  one  of  the  men  Johnson  liked,  not  Andrew,  but  Samuel, 
though  Andrew  would  not  object  to  the  opinion,  a  good  hater.  He 
is  a  terrible  hater.  And  the  worst  is,  his  hatred  is  in  perfect  method. 
He  finds  all  there  is  black  in  his  adversary,  and  he  hurls  it  at  him  in 
the  best,  that  is,  the  broadest  of  English. 

He  is  mild-spoken,  genial,  fascinating  in  conversation,  rich  in  fact 
and  thought,  a  delightful  whisperer,  for  his  talk  is  all  in  whispers. 
He  looks  not  unlike  Father  Taylor,  whom  he  resembles  also  in  many 
features  of  mind,  though  he  is  more  of  a  dead-in-earnest  debater, 
that  rare  wit  caring  but  little  which  side  he  fought  on.  He  bears  no 
malice,  and  talks  of  his  antagonists  as  a  rival  lawyer  would,  more 
with  the  instinct  of  combativeness  than  destructiveness. 

BROTHER  TATE. 
A  blacker  man  you  never  saw  nor  one  less  Apolloish.  A  large,  strong- 
featured,  Erebus  gentleman,  with  open  collar  and  tossed-up  l:)osom, 
and  indifferent  clothes,  but  not  unseemly,  as  if  he  cared  nothing  for 
nobody,  and  was  perfectly  willing  that  every-body  should  know  it. 
"  You'll  hear  some  fun,"  says  a  live  Yankee,  now  elevated  to  the 
dignity  of  eldership,  "when  Brother  Tate  reports  his  district."  And, 
sure  enough,  the  heavy,  gruff  voice,  the  calm,  cold,  careless  manner 
of  the  tall,  broad-chested  black  man  arrest  attention  at  once.  His 
words  keep  the  attention  afterward.  He  takes  up  his  men  and 
\\o\\  serz'atzm,  and  each  receives  a  compliment  and  a  "but,"  the 
butt  end  of  a  whip  sometimes.    But  every  "but  "  is  not  for  them. 


4P2 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


It  is  for  the  lily  hued  brethren  (all  but  the  lily)  on  the  other  side  of 
that  pew  line  between  the  southern  half  of  that  row  of  seats,  and  its 
northern,  a  thin  piece  of  board,  but  impassable  by  his  color  as  the 
great  gulf  was  by  the  rich  man  and  Lazarus.  In  this  case  it  is 
Lazarus  that  is  kept  from  creeping  over.  His  words  pass  over, 
however,  as  in  the  former  case,  and  sound  sharply  and  pleasantly  in 
his  brethren's  ears.  They  feel  and  enjoy  his  hits.  He  describes  ^ 
brother  and  his  attempt  to  carry  on  a  hopeless  enterprise.  He 
preached  to  a  congregation  consisting  of  himself;  took  up  the  col- 
lection from  himself,  which,  consequently,  was  not  large  ;  held  class 
all  to  himself,  which  did  not  make  it  very  long ;  said  every  Sunday 
that  he  would  never  try  it  again  ;  and  at  last  backed  out  of  the 
church,  gave  up  the  key,  and  retired  in  disgust.  "  The  trouble," 
he  adds,  "  with  this  brother  is  that  he  has  too  much  Scotch-Irish 
blood  in  him,  which  makes  him  lose  his  temper  too  easily." 

Another  is  described  as  a  "  Dutch-Irish  nigger,  who  ought  to  be 
in  the  penitentiar)-,  who  went  West  and  when  last  heard  from  was 
in  Missouri,  and  probably  is  now  somewhere  far  out  in  that  country 
State."  When  one  of  Brother  Tate's  men  was  proposed  for  mission- 
ar)^  ordination,  one  on  the  other  side  of  the  color  gulf  was  advising 
his  taking  a  regular  course.  "  Yes,"  melodiously  thunders  Brother 
Tate,  "  w^e  have  noticed  how  the  superior  color  is  injured  by  put- 
ting them  along  too  fast."  The  cool,  biting  tone  of  sarcasm  in  which 
those  comparatives  are  used  is  one  that  Disraeli  would  envy.  He 
characterized  one  itinerant  on  his  district  as  "  a  good  brother,  but 
rather  lazy.  This  is  because  he  has  so  much  Anglo-Saxon  blood  in 
him.  But  he  is  not  to  blame  for  that."  At  which  all  laugh  and 
accept  the  shot. 

Behind  their  backs  he  laughs  heartily  at  the  prejudices  of  his 
brethren,  but  no  one  knows  better  than  he  how  to  nurse  them,  and 
stab  their  pet  at  the  same  time.  He  is  a  rare  specimen  of 
genius. 

One  remarkable  feature  of  Bishop  Haven's  work  grew 
directly  out  of  his  unusual  interest  in   public  affairs. 


Bishop  Haven.  403 

He  had  been  accustomed  in  the  "  Herald  "  office  to 
point  out  the  sins  of  America  in  all  matters  of  general 
interest.  Our  offenses  and  omissions  of  duty  in  dealing 
with  the  Indians,  the  blacks,  the  question  of  divorce,  the 
problem  of  Mormonism,  the  Chinese  in  America,  the 
custom  of  dueling  and  assassination,  so  prevalent  in 
some  parts  of  the  country,  he  discussed.  He  was  very 
quick  and  careful  in  gathering  up  information  on  these 
social  aspects  of  American  life  from  every  quarter.  ■  His 
private  Journal  noted  many  such  facts  which  he  was 
not  permitted  to  give  to  the  public  ;  others  crept  into 
his  sermons  and  led  him  to  enliven  his  discourses  with 
denunciations  of  evils  prevalent  in  the  communities 
among  which  he  spoke  the  Word  of  life,  and  others 
went  abroad  over  the  whole  land  on  the  pinions  of 
the  papers.  In  a  "  Sabbath  Among  the  White  Earth 
Indians,"  he  touched  off  a  picturesque  account  with 
matters  of  graver  import  : 

White  Earth  Lake  is  a  beautiful  sheet,  embedded  in  white  soil, 
encircled  in  more  lustrous  green.  The  dusky  audience  gather  on 
the  piles  of  lumber,  reclining  at  their  ease,  one  of  them  lighting  his 
pipe,  as  the  soldiers  used  to  do  at  Sabbath  service  on  Relay  Heights. 
A  fine  looking  gentleman,  with  plume  in  cap  and  blanket  hung  care- 
lessly over  his  shoulder,  sat  smiling  quietly,  his  sharp  black  eye 
being  full  of  strength  and  repose.  Another  small  old  man  stood 
erect  through  the  whole  sermon.  .  .  .  After  our  short  sermon  the 
little  old  man  motioned  a  desire  to  speak.  He  came  down  to  our 
pile  of  lumber  and  began  to  speak  with  great  earnestness  of  voice 
and  gesture.  Mr.  Beaulieu  interpreted  his  speech.  It  was  this : 
"  About  four  years  ago  [he  marked  off  these  four  years  on  his  fin- 
gers] I  came  to  the  conclusion  that  a  change  must  come  over  our 


404  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

people.  The  nomadic  course  of  life  must  come  to  an  end.  I  had  also 
concluded  to  join  the  Church.  I  had  a  paper  drawn  up  and  signed 
that  in  two  years  I  would  join  the  Church.  [He  supposed  he  was 
speaking  to  Bishop  Whipple,  who  annually  visits  the  Reservation.] 
That  time  has  arrived,  and  I  have  sent  for  you  to  fulfill  that  agree- 
ment. I  am  glad  you  are  come.  Now  I  am  ready  to  join  the 
Church  if  you  will  make  an  agreement.  I  have  lost  two  sons  lately. 
One  of  them,  was  killed  by  the  Sioux.  I  do  not  ask  any  help  in  that 
case.  I  will  take  care  of  that.  The  other  was  killed  by  the  whites. 
The  whites  are  too  much  for  me.  If  you  will  agree  that  the  whites 
shall  make  proper  amends  for  his  death,  I  will  join  the  Church." 

I  disabused  his  mind  as  to  the  preacher,  and  talked  to  him  and  his 
brethren  on  "  If  thine  enemy  hunger,  feed  him,"  as  a  duty  they  owed 
to  the  Sioux.  The  interpreter  laid  down  the  Gospel  with  special 
unction,  and  poured  the  coals  of  fire  crushingly  on  his  head.  The 
old  chief  heard  the  interpreter  through,  shrugged  his  shoulders,  and 
said,  "  Ugh  !  " 

Why  the  Indian  had  such  notions  of  Christians  the 
following  may  be  meant  to  show : 

The  President 's  policy  is  not  very  popular  here,  nor  very  popular  with 
the  politicians.  They  have  kept  the  Indian  Agency  as  one  of  their  rich- 
est perquisites  for  relatives  and  dependents.  It  has  been  taken  from 
them,  and  they  repay  the  act  by  every  sort  of  denunciation  of  the  Indian. 
The  papers  are  kept  full  of  their  barbarities,  so  called,  while  the 
preliminary  and  far  worse  barbarities  of  the  white  settlers  and  specu- 
lators are  left  unrecorded.  Take  an  instance  at  hand  :  A  school 
teacher  was  outraged,  murdered,  and  mutilated  not  far  from  Brain- 
ard  by  one  or  more  Indians,  made  drunk,  lustful,  and  murderous  by 
the  white  man's  whisky,  sold  by  the  authority  of  the  Christian  State 
of  Minnesota.  The  Indian  women  found  out  who  the  murderer  was, 
and  told  his  name.  The  sheriff  came  to  the  agency  and  arrested 
the  accused.  He  took  another  with  him  under  suspicion.  Mr. 
Smith  told  the  Indians  to  go.    They  would  have  a  fair  trial,  and,  if 


Bishop  Haven. 


405 


innocent,  would  be  cleared.  One  of  them  was  as  innocent  as  a 
babe.  They  went  without  resistance  on  this  promise.  The  sheriff 
put  them  in  the  jail  at  Brainard,  a  rough  "construction  "  town,  full 
of  gamblers  and  drunkards  and  saloons.  These  wretches  raved  at 
the  Indians  with  all  the  atrociousness  of  our  race  in  its  degradation 
— and  none  is  more  atrocious — broke  open  the  jail  with  the  conniv- 
ance of  the  sheriff,  took  out  the  Indians  and  hung  them  to  a  tall  pine 
in  the  street,  overhanging  a  saloon  called  the  Last  Turn— the  des- 
perate fortunes  of  the  proprietor  giving  it  this  prophetic  designation. 

Was  any  thing  done  by  that  sheriff  or  State  to  arrest  that  hang- 
man ?  He  boasted  of  his  deed  openly  and  to  strangers  for  days 
afterward.  None  presumed  to  touch  him.  What  did  the  State  do  .> 
Why,  raised  a  furor  that  there  was  to  be  another  Indian  massacre, 
and  General  Howard  telegraphed  that  troops  were  wanted  to  keep 
the  natives  quiet.  Such  has  been  our  constant  course  toward  our 
weaker  brethren. 

Mr.  Haven's  remedy  for  all  this  mischief  was  to  make 
the  Indian  a  citizen,  clothed  with  all  the  rights  and 
subject  to  all  the  responsibilities  of  citizenship.  He  felt 
sure  that  this  course  would  in  time  change  the  face  of 
our  Indian  population.  He  not  only  believed  in  the 
fitness  of  the  red  man  for  civil  equality,  but  also  in  the 
reality  of  the  religious  work  carried  on  among  them. 

The  Indian  is  attaining  Christianity.  It  may  be  imperfect.  What 
is  yours,  good  reader  ?  But  it  is  the  real  article.  Churches  I  heard 
of  about  Winnipeg  and  saw  at  White  Earth,  ministers  I  have  met, 
children  I  have  heard  sing,  assure  me  that  the  light  which  lighteth 
every  man  that  cometh  into  the  world  hath  shined  into  their  hearts 
to  give  the  light  of  the  glory  of  God  in  the  face  of  Jesus  Christ. 
They  sing  our  pleasant  songs,  they  recite  the  commandments  and 
creed,  they  enjoy  spiritual  feasts,  they  grow  in  this  grace.  This  will 
change  and  tame  these  tribes. 


4o6  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

He  once  spent  a  night  in  company  with  Dr.  Dashiell, 
who  was  a  Democrat,  in  a  region  where  the  Indians 
were  thick,  and  somewhat  dangerous.  The  pair  had 
their  room  together,  though  they  took  different  beds. 
Neither  slept  very  well.  About  midnight  Bishop  Ha- 
ven, cold,  nervous,  sleepless,  and  somewhat  frightened, 
spoke  up : 

"  Dr.  Dashiell,  are  you  asleep 

"  No,  Bishop." 

"  Are  you  warm  ?  " 
No,  Bishop." 

Is  there  any  danger  from  the  Indians  ?  " 
"  Some,  Bishop." 

They  got  into  the  same  bed,  piling  on  all  the  bed 
clothing  they  had  ;  then  Bishop  Haven  lay  down  at 
the  back  side  and  Dashiell  at  the  front.  Then  the 
Bishop  said,  Now  I  am  going  to  put  in  some  solid 
sleep.  It  is  a  comfort  to  think  that  the  red  skins  will 
have  to  kill  at  least  one  Copperhead  before  they  can  get 
at  me." 

On  a  visit  to  one  of  those  States  of  the  Union  which 
have  won  an  unenviable  notoriety  for  their  looseness  in 
the  matter  of  divorce,  he  took  great  pains  to  obtain 
exact  information  as  to  the  practical  operation  of  such 
institutions.  He  found  all  the  testimony  he  desired  as 
to  their  unwholesome  fruits.  He  heard  of  clergymen 
making  their  pastoral  calls  in  a  very  anxious  frame  of 
mind  lest  some  chance  remark  or  question  should  be 
taken  amiss  by  those  they  met.  One  minister  stated  that 
he  was  often  afraid  to  ask  ladies  on  whom  he  was  making 


Bishop  Haven.  407 

his  first  call  about  their  husbands  lest  the  absent  hus- 
band should  be  reported  divorced;  and  another  said  that 
he  protected  himself  against  such  difficulties  by  taking 
some  person  with  him  who  could  put  him  on  his  guard 
against  venturing  any  such  questions  where  it  would  be 
a  delicate  business  to  respond.  He  saw  that  such  a 
state  of  affairs  would  put  a  padlock  upon  the  mouths  of 
many  timid  and  all  time-serving  ministers  in  discussing 
with  all  boldness  the  law  of  God  as  it  bears  upon  the 
marriage  covenant. 

He  sent  forth  his  voice  of  warning  and  rebuke  on  the 
subject  w^ith  his  usual  insight  and  earnestness.  He 
blamed  all  Churches,  and  especially  his  own,  for  not 
following  the  rule  of  Jesus  instead  of  human  law.  He 
also  praised  the  Catholic  Church  for  its  noble  fidelity  on 
this  delicate  and  troublesome  subject.  He  warned  all 
ministers  that  they  must  denounce  this  sin  on  their  re- 
sponsibility before  God. 

When  Mr.  Haven  visited  the  Pacific  coast,  the  last 
year  of  his  life,  he  showed  the  same  swift  insight  of  the 
popular  and  perilous  sins  of  that  region.  The  public 
sentiment  against  the  Chinese  was  so  strong  as  to  make 
it  a  difficult  matter  to  discuss  on  the  spot.  Mr.  Blaine 
had  just  made  an  adroit  and  unscrupulous  bid  for  polit- 
ical support  there  by  utterances  which  appealed  too 
plainly  to  popular  prejudices.  Mr.  Haven  instantly 
made  his  addresses  in  Conference,  his  sermons  and  his 
lectures  ring  with  a  cool  exposure  of  the  unchristian, 
selfish,  and  non-American  nature  of  the  feeling  against 
the  Chinese. 


4o8 


Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 


Twenty-five  years  earlier  he  had  denounced  the 
Know-Nothing  movement  as  hostile  to  all  true 
American  principles,  and  had  charged  its  abettors 
with  narrowness  and  intolerance.  Hence  he  was 
quite  familiar  with  the  best  and  most  effective  lines 
of  attack  on  that  favorite  wickedness  of  the  Pacific 
slope.  It  did  not  worry  him  at  all  that  the  newspapers 
of  the  region  responded  somewhat  violently,  for  he 
knew  that  speech  is  free  and  safe  in  all  that  broad  do- 
main. He  could  speak  out  his  inmost  thoughts  with 
no  such  fears  that  an  assassin's  bullet  might  silence  his 
daring  discourse  as  sometimes  haunted  him  in  the  South. 

When  Mr.  Haven  visited  Utah,  saw  its  social  organ- 
ization for  himself,  gathered  information  in  regard  to 
the  actual  workings  of  those  infamous  institutions,  and 
gathered  up  the  results  of  his  inspection  in  a  telling 
and  scathing  account  of  "  The  American  Ulcer,"  he 
gained  general  applause.  It  is  so  popular  to  denounce 
The  Latter  Day  Saints  "  that  only  Mormons  objected. 
There  was  no  doubt  in  his  mind  that  all  such  denuncia- 
tions of  Mormon  abominations  were  the  natural  out- 
growth of  the  doctrines  of  the  Bible  and  the  principles 
of  republicanism.  But  he  saw  just  as  plainly  that  the 
sins  of  California,  of  our  Indian  policy,  of  intemperance, 
of  free  divorce,  of  dueling,  of  caste  sentiment,  and  of 
hatred  to  human  fraternity,  ought  to  be  subjected  to  a 
like  universal  and  vigorous  arraignment. 

When  Bishop  Haven  first  entered  on  his  Southern 
residence  he  gathered  up  in  his  public  correspondence 
all  kinds  of  facts  throwing  light  on  the  condition  of  the 


Bishop  Haven. 


409 


negroes  in  the  old  days  of  slavery.  As  he  talked  with 
all  sorts  of  colored  people,  he  had  no  difficulty  in  find- 
ing facts  enough  of  the  most  fearful  nature  wherewith 
to  bolster  up  his  stern  indictment  of  that  unhallowed 
system.  He  gives  the  names  and  residences  of  many  of 
these  parties  in  the  private  Journal.  It  does  not  appear 
that  he  had  any  especial  end  in  view  in  gleaning  up 
such  facts.  Perhaps  he  wished  to  be  able  to  show  any 
gainsayer  that  the  abominations  charged  on  slavery 
were  not  half  equal  to  the  truth ;  perhaps  he  desired  to 
enter  them  as  memorials  of  evil  days  soon  to  pass  away 
from  the  face  of  the  earth ;  and  possibly  they  had  a 
polemical  purpose  in  case  rash  editors  should  impeach 
his  statements  as  incorrect. 

He  noted  the  changed  condition  of  the  colored  men 
with  a  grateful  eye.    Some  of  these  notes  follow :  ^ 

I  took  tea  in  Baltimore  with  Brother  CooI<,  and  met  there  several 
ministers,  Edwards,  Diehl,  and  ,  of  Union  Square  and  City  Sta- 
tion. In  a  conversation  on  the  unity  of  all  races,  the  latter  brother 
said  he  was  a  native  of  Napan,  and  had  lived  in  the  British  West 
Indies.  Though  the  negro  had  every  right  and  filled  every  office, 
doctor,  lawyer,  judge,  etc.,  there  was  no  intermarriage.  I  told  him 
Mr.  Bleby,  a  Wesleyan  missionary,  according  to  Dr.  Stevens,  had 
married  a  colored  lady  for  his  second  wife.  He  grew  warm,  said  he 
knew  Mr.  Bleby,  whose  son  had  married  his  niece,  and  that  the 
young  folks  were  on  their  way  to  visit  him.  I  told  him  Dr.  Stevens 
was  my  authority,  and  that  the  latter  said  he  would  do  the  same  thing 
if  he  lived  in  the  West  Indies.  As  he  did  not  know  the  second  Mrs. 
Bleby,  Dr.  Stevens  may  be  correct. 

This  conversation  was  brought  about  by  the  fact  that  Mrs.  Cook 

was  an  unm.arried  daughter  of  Brother  Tarboe  when  I  first  visited 
18  ^ 


4IO  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Baltimore,  in  1861,  with  General  Butler.  At  Brother  Cook's  store 
I  met  her  father,  who  invited  me  to  his  house.  I  spent  the  evening 
with  them.  The  talk  drifted  to  amalgamation,  as  it  always  does 
here,  showing  what  they  dread.  I  said  that  was  none  of  our  busi- 
ness. They  asked  me  if  I  would  marry  white  and  black  ?  I  replied, 
"  I  have  done  it."  Their  appearance  was  frightfully  amusing.  Get- 
ting over  the  horror,  they  exclaimed,  "  If  that  were  known  in  the 
city  of  Baltimore  ten  thousand  soldiers  couldn't  save  you  from  a 
coat  of  tar  and  feathers.  I  knew  they  could  not  keep  it  secret,  and 
so  quietly  added,  "  Well,  it  will  be  known  by  to-morrow  morning." 

That  story  of  eleven  years  ago  and  this  to-night  fitly  come  to- 
gether. The  change  has  been  enormous.  It  will  be  less  so  to 
reach  the  utter  abolition  of  all  such  sinful  caste. 

My  being  here  makes  some  talk.  Coming  up  on  the  boat  it  was 
whispered  that  I  was  an  amalgamationist  Bishop,  and  after  sermon 
a  Miss  Clark,  whom  I  knew  twenty  years  since  in  Northampton,  and 
her  father  spoke  with  me.  They  said  when  they  were  coming  a  friend 
asked  them,  "Are  you  going  to  hear  that  amalgamationist  preach  ?  " 

"  Are  you  going  for  Greeley  ?  "  was  the  retort. 

"  It  isn't  best  to  talk  politics  on  Sunday,"  was  the  quick  counter 
thrust. 

In  a  letter  to  a  newspaper  he  gives  us  another  glimpse 
of  the     New  Baltimore:  " 

On  the  anniversar}^  of  Bull  Run  I  had  the  privilege  of  speaking 
in  a  Baltimore  pulpit,  and  the  same  evening  of  sitting  at  a  Baltimore 
gentleman's  table,  that  of  David  Creamer,  Esq.,  with  a  presiding 
elder  of  the  Washington  (colored)  Conference,  Rev.  Mr.  Br>-ce,  on 
the  right  hand  of  the  host,  and  several  ministers  of  the  Baltimore 
Conference  around  the  board.  I  am  not  aware  that  even  Brooklyn 
saw  that  sight  at  the  General  Conference,  though  Mr.  Knapp's  brill- 
iant reception  was  equally  impartial  in  its  invitation. 

The  novelty  of  the  condition  of  things  in  the  South 
was  especially  impressive,  too,  in  its  public  as  well  as 


Bishop  Havex. 


411 


social  aspects  in  certain  Southern  States.  Hence  he 
describes  what  he  calls 

THE  NEWEST  SOUTH. 

I  have  found  a  place  for  my  superlative.  It  did  not  belong  to 
Baltimore.  A  city  growing  in  ideas  does  not  deserve  that  epithet. 
But  New  Orleans  does.  She  showed  sights  which  only  the  superla- 
tive degree  of  novelty  can  properly  describe. 

It  began  in  the  Preachers'  Meeting.  One  of  our  wisest  leaders 
says  the  devil  invented  the  Preachers'  Meeting.  He  would  hardly 
have  thought  so  had  he  been  in  New  Orleans  the  morning  after  my 
arrival.  There  I  beheld  the  newest  newness  of  the  Church  of  Christ. 
In  Ames  Church  sat  a  president  of  a  city  Preachers'  Meeting  of  the 
loyal  color  of  the  South. 

Some  of  the  fathers  of  our  Methodism  in  this  city  and  State  were 
among  those  present,  the  fathers  of  the  Methodism  that  was  and  is 
to  be.  Among  them  was  Father  Green,  a  good-natured,  common 
sense,  wide-awake  brother,  whose  fires  are  getting  well  besprinkled 
with  ashes,  but  who  shows  in  his  age  the  activity  of  his  youth. 
Emperor  Williams  was  perhaps  rightly  named,  for  he  is  iuiperator 
still.  He  remembers  the  first  Conference  held  here  after  1844,  when 
Bishop  Janes  was  sent  down  to  stay,  if  possible,  the  downward 
progress  of  the  brethren  of  that  generation  ;  he  was  sent  in  vain. 
To  destroy  slavery  the  Church  was  given  over  to  slavery,  and  the 
fierce  debate  of  that  hour  impressed  itself  on  the  hot  heart  of  this 
youthful  Emperor,  possibly  a  slave  then  ;  despised  and  ignored  cer- 
tainly by  his  lighter  kindred  ;  of  no  value  in  their  eyes  save  such 
as  he  might  have  in  the  market-place.  He  is  now  a  commander  in 
the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  one  of  our  wisest  ministers  and 
presiding  elders,  who  is  molding  the  State  in  truth  and  righteous- 
ness. He  is  short,  thick-set,  with  round  head,  a  dark  brown  face. 
His  smile  is  affable,  his  bearing  courteous. 

The  president  let  me  also  introduce  you  to.  Rev.  Mr.  Darbis,  for- 
merly of  Cincinnati.    He  is  one  of  the  mixed  hue  so  common  here, 


412  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


black  being  almost  as  rare  a  color  as  white.  He  is  clear-cut  in 
features,  with  bright  black  eyes,  tall  form,  and  a  pleasant  voice.  He 
has  one  distinction  of  which  he  probably  is  very  proud.  In  his 
house  I  saw  a  superb  engraving  of  the  General  Conference  of  the 
Church  South,  held  at  Nashville  in  1856.  It  is  very  large  and  ex- 
cellently gotten  up.  The  hall  of  the  House  of  Representatives  in 
that  capitoi  is  the  room.  The  platform  presents  the  body  of  the 
Bishops,  the  venerable  Soule  standing  stately  in  front.  The  sides 
of  the  gallery  are  adorned  with  portraits  of  Methodistic  celebrities  of 
their  own  and  the  ante-forty-times,  Dr.  Capers  being  most  elabo- 
rately portrayed.  Bishop  Hedding  is  absent,  but  Bishop  Emory  is 
allowed  to  stand  among  the  fathers.  The  gallery  is  set  off  with  the 
ladies  of  the  Conference,  and  the  floor  with  the  Conference.  Each 
is  in  the  best  array  of  countenance  and  confidence.  Close  by  the 
secretary's  desk,  which  Dr.  Cross  occupies,  stands  the  only  black 
man  allowed  to  appear  in  that  august  assembly.  To  make  it  evi- 
dent to  all  that  he  is  not  a  member,  but  a  hewer  of  wood  and  drawer 
of  water  to  the  true  Israelites,  he  is  represented  in  the  act  of  pour- 
ing out  water.  The  liquor  flashes  on  its  way  from  pitcher  to 
glass.  It  is  extra  abundant.  As  if  to  prevent  all  possibility  of  mis- 
take, Dr.  Cross  looks  out  on  the  grand  assemblage  utterly  unconscious 
of  this  dusky  Gibeonite.  as  is  also  the  vv^hole  distinguished  body. 
Yet  that  drawer  of  water,  a  Nehemiah,  cup-bearer  to  these  kings, 
is  himself  a  king  to-day,  and  these— well  not  where  they  were. 

It  is  Rev.  Mr.  Darbis,  the  President  of  the  New  Orleans  Preach- 
ers' Meeting,  who  held  that  office  and  won  that  place  in  the  grand 
engraving  of  the  Church  South.  Janitor  of  the  capitoi,  he  was 
allowed  to  appear  in  the  front  of  the  picture  ;  like  Daniel  among  the 
lords  of  Belshazzar's  court,  he  appears  as  forerunner  of  a  coming 
doom  and  type  of  a  coming  dawn.  This  engraving  was  made,  I 
believe,  for  the  Metropolitan  Church  at  Washington.  The  only  copy 
I  have  ever  seen  of  it  hangs  in  a  black  man's  parlor,  while  the  body  it 
commemorates  is  finding  its  success  only  in  fraternity  with  the  breth- 
ren it  then  rejected  as  of  another  race  and  condition.  Mr.  Darbis 
pointed  to  one  gentleman  standing  in  the  center  of  the  body  (I  am 


Bishop  Haven. 


413 


glad  I  have  forgotten  his  name)  who  gave  an  address  on  the  subject 
of  the  negro,  in  which  he  said  that  some  of  this  sort  of  men  in  the 
center  of  Africa  had  their  heels  so  long  that  they  could  not  tell  until 
they  were  ten  years  old  which  way  they  would  walk,  and  probably 
were  able  to  walk  either  way  with  equal  ease  ;  a  fortunate  condition 
for  politicians  in  Church  and  State,  some  of  whom  always  seem  to 
be  thus  constructed.  He  also  said  their  hair  was  not  wool,  it  was 
porcupine's  quills. 

But  I  can  show  you  a  still  greater  novelty  than  this,  even — the 
government  of  Louisiana.  It  is  the  best  specimen  the  country  has 
to-day  of  its  near  future.  You  recall  the  massacre  of  1866  or  1867, 
when  Rev.  Mr.  Horton,  son  of  Rev.  Jotham  Horton,  of  New  En- 
gland abolition  fame,  with  his  companions,  was  done  to  death  by 
the  bullets  and  bayonets  of  a  dying  curse.  Now  enter  the  same 
building.  The  streets  are  not  filled  with  raging  men,  nor  rife  with 
shots  and  shouts  and  groans,  and  "  the  silent  horror  of  death."  A 
few  men  gather  about  the  entrance  and  passages,  less  than  com- 
monly obstruct  legislative  bodies.  A  few  soldiers  sit  quietly  in  the 
vestibule.  Go  straight  ahead  to  the  end  of  the  passage-way  and 
you  enter  the  Senate  Chamber.  A  colored  gentleman,  grave  and 
dignified,  is  opening  the  session.  Senators  of  all  hues  sit  solemn  in 
their  curule  chairs,  or  cordially  chat  in  undistinguishable  com- 
munion. 

Above,  the  House  is  more  black,  and  less  orderly,  as  the  House 
usually  is.  But  no  disorder  makes  it  unmindful  of  parliamentary 
rules,  and  the  rapid  raps  of  the  nervous  young  speaker  keep  the 
body  in  the  tightest  reins  of  discipline. 

Many  of  the  white  members  and  ministers  of  the 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church  in  the  South  were  drawn 
to  its  fellowship  on  account  of  their  intense  devotion  to 
the  Union.  They  had  long  been  Methodists,  loyal  in 
every  fiber  of  their  hearts  to  the  constitution  and  laws 
of  the  land.    They  regarded  secession  as  not  only  polit- 


414  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


ical  madness,  but  also  religious  sin.  They  did  all  they 
could  to  hinder  it.  When  civil  war  began  they  had  all 
sorts  of  sacrifices  and  losses  and  injuries  to  undergo. 
The  storm  broke  over  them  in  fury  and  raged  for  long 
and  mournful  years.  The  ]\Iethodist  Episcopal  Church, 
South,  was  woefully  tainted  with  treason,  and  hence  was 
entirely  unacceptable  to  these  ardent  patriots.  Mean- 
while the  latter  did  not  share  the  intense  antipathy  to 
slavery  and  the  caste  feeling  which  Northern  Christians 
so  generally  entertain.  They  welcomed  only  pastors 
who  shared  their  loyalty  to  the  old  flag,  and  were  ready 
to  take  their  places  by  thousands  in  the  loyal  bosom  of 
the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  They  did  not  gen- 
erally share  Bishop  Haven's  sentiments  concerning  the 
wickedness  of  all  separations  among  Christians  of  the 
same  faith  on  any  grounds  of  descent  or  color.  To 
some  of  them  he  was  not  an  entirely  welcome  Bishop, 
though  their  dislike  almost  always  died  out  when 
brought  face  to  face  with  his  telling  example  of  self- 
sacrifice  and  devotion.  But  he  was  as  faithful  against 
their  sinful  narrowness  as  he  was  appreciative  of  their 
zeal  for  the  flag  and  against  traitors  of  every  name. 
His  private  Journal  shows  his  bearing  toward  them  in 
such  matters. 

I  had  concluded  before  these  Conferences  began  that  I  would 
proceed  impartially,  as  I  had  done  in  the  North.  There  was  great 
fear  that  I  should  destroy  somebody  or  something,  so  I  proceeded  to 
first  administer  the  sacrament.  It  was  not  ready  at  the  time  of 
opening  Conference,  as  I  had  not  given  the  brethren  notice  of  my 
intentions.    I  sat  in  the  pulpit  half  an  hour  waiting  for  the  elements. 


Bishop  Haven. 


415 


I  next  read  the  thirteenth  of  St.  John  and  parts  of  the  tenth  of  First 
Corinthians,  and  then  asked  all  the  presiding  elders  forward  to  assist. 
Two  of  them  were  colored.  All  came.  I  gave  them  the  elements  ^ 
before  taking  them  myself,  so  that  none  should  say  that  I  was  not  ; 
willing  to  do  as  I  would  have  others  do.  The  next  table  was  all 
whites,  the  next  of  both  sorts,  and  the  next  of  ladies  and  others. 
The  ice  was  broken  at  the  start.  The  Church  South  ministers  ridi- 
culed our  men  for  partaking  of  the  sacrament  with  niggers,  but  our 
men  defended  themselves.  One  said,  "  You  have  taken  your  food 
after  niggers  have  chewed  it,  and  yet  you  ridicule  us  for  partaking  of 
the  Lord's  Supper  together." 

I  made  the  colored  brethren  give  up  separate  services  at  night, 
and  they  were  present  at  church  in  one  of  the  amen  corners.  Sab- 
bath-day I  had  the  brethren  called  up  in  alphabetical  order.  A  bit- 
ter caste  man  called  them,  confessing  himself  that  it  was  right.  I 
preached  on  the  parable  of  the  leaven.  They  seemed  profited  by 
the  truth.  It  is  a  great  change  within  a  few  years,  and  will  lead  to 
greater  ones. 

At  Tullahoma,  where  I  met  the  Tennessee  Conference,  I  had  a 
less  enjoyable  time.  I  began  in  the  same  way,  and  the  colored 
elders  assisted  by  distributing  the  elements  and  dismissing  the  ta- 
bles. But  the  Conference  was  evenly  balanced.  The  pivot  on  which 
every  thing  turned  was  white  and  black ;  but  the  force  that  turned 
it  was  the  proposal  to  admit  a  colored  man  who  had  married  the 
woman  he  had  lived  with  for  twenty  years.  He  had  been  prose- 
cuted for  this  act,  and  pending  the  suit  the  woman  had  died. 
Brother  V.  said  if  he  was  admitted  at  least  a  dozen  men  would  lo- 
cate. I  told  him  if  they  located  for  that  reason  their  places  would 
be  filled  in  six  weeks.  Secession  is  as  vain  a  threat  in  Church  as  in 
State.  He  reported  my  remarks  outside.  Some  of  the  ministers  got 
excited,  though  every  thing  went  on  pleasantly. 

Saturday  the  case  came  up,  and  it  went  on  the  table  instantly,  ten 
men  jumping  to  their  feet  to  make  the  motion,  and  all  of  them 
greatly  excited.  I  preached  on,  "  Ye  have  an  unction  from  the  Holy 
One,  and  know  all  things."    I  had  much  liberty  in  unfolding  the  su- 


4i6 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


periorily  of  Christians  in  knowledge  and  power,  and  the  necessity  of 
showing  this  by  adhesion  to  principle.  In  the  ordination  of  the 
elders  I  asked  the  colored  elders  to  assist  in  the  laying  on  of  hands ; 
a  new  sight  here. 

The  Georgia  Conference  met  at  Atlanta.  They  got  wind  of  my 
course,  and  when  sacrament  was  prepared  not  one  of  the  white 
brethren  would  partake  of  it,  except  the  elders.  Several  sat  grouty  in 
their  seats.  Most  stayed  out  or  left  the  house.  Brother  P.  sat  chief 
and  stiffest  through  it  all.  It  was  a  fearful  exposure  of  this  sin  of 
caste  in  its  depths.  I  felt  it  keenly,  but  the  elders  felt  it  worse  than  I. 
I  arranged  to  ask  Brother  P.  to  lead  the  morning  prayer-meeting 
next  day,  and  then  put  him  on  a  committee  with  a  colored  minister 
as  chairman.  He  grew  in  grace  every  day,  and  so  did  the  others. 
The  house  was  well  filled,  and  in  the  middle  seats  blacks  and  whites 
-got  badly  mixed  up.  A  report  in  partial  approval  of  colored  Con- 
ferences was  introduced,  and  awakened  vigorous  discussion.  It 
prevailed.  It  will  have  hard  work  to  go  through  next  year  unless 
somebody  presides  who  favors  it. 

There  was  no  special  friction  at  this  session,  though  many  ex- 
pected it.  Their  complimentary  words  were  honest,  1  think.  But 
caste  is  yet  here.  A  resolution  to  ignore  it  in  the  sittings  of  the 
Conference  was  tabled  by  all  the  whites.  They  agreed,  however, 
to  have  the  next  session  at  a  colored  church  in  Rome,  quite  an 
advance. 

The  last  Conference  was  in  many  respects  the  worst.  It  was 
held  in  the  woods  near  Lebanon.  I  have  described  it  mostly  in  a 
public  letter.  Some  things  I  did  not  dare  write  there.  The  preju- 
dice against  the  colored  brother  was  immense.  As  I  stood  in  the 
parlor  of  Mr.  Hoge,  Brother  Lakin,  a  presiding  elder,  saw  another 
colored  presiding  elder  going  by  with  two  ministers.  He  called 
them  in  and  introduced  them.  They  sat  down  a  few  moments. 
On  their  going  out  a  lad  of  eighteen  said  to  Lakin,  "  Don't  you  ask 
another  colored  man  in  here."  He  promised  not  to.  That  noon  I 
told  the  presiding  elders  to  m.eet  me  at  Mr.  Hoge's.  Brother  Louis 
came  trembling.    They  were  surprised  to  see  him  cross  their  thresh- 


Bishop  Haven.  417 

old,  and,  opening  the  door,  told  me  a  colored  man  wished  to  see  me. 
I  said,  "  Let  him  come  in."  The  next  day  we  were  put  in  a  back 
room.  Saturday  the  girls  told  Louis  to  go  around  by  the  back  way. 
The  boy  put  his  head  into  the  room  and  said,  "  Bishop,  here's  a 
nigger  wants  to  see  you."  I  was  very  indignant  as  I  went  out,  and 
said,  "  Don't  you  ever  again  insult  any  gentleman  who  comes  to  see 
me  by  calling  him  nicknames."  It  was  a  colored  youth  on  horse- 
back with  a  telegram.  I  had  hardly  got  back  into  the  room  when 
word  was  brought  that  the  Mission  Committee,  a  committee  ordered 
by  the  Conference,  was  at  the  gate,  but  the  girls  would  not  let  the 
colored  members  in.  I  was  angry  exceedingly,  and  had  it  not  been 
so  late  in  the  session  should  have  sought  other  quarters.  But  I  saw 
that  would  make  trouble,  so  I  followed  Job's  example  and  swallowed 
down  my  spittle. 

But  the  next  day  the  tent  was  crowded  full  of  whites,  and  I  had 
the  privilege  of  ordering  the  front  seats  vacated  for  the  black  candi- 
dates, and  also  of  asking  Brother  Louis  to  assist  in  the  ordination 
of  the  candidates  as  they  stood  in  alphabetical  order  before  the 
amazed  multitude. 

I  asked  Mr.  Hoge  if  we  could  have  a  meeting  of  the  elders  and 
the  Mission  Committee  in  his  house.  He  consented.  Unwisely  I 
allowed  some  one  to  announce  the  latter,  and  his  girls  sprang  on 
him,  so  that  he  had  to  ask  to  withdraw  his  consent.  The  elders, 
however,  sat  in  the  parlor  till  midnight.  Next  morning  the  Mission 
Committee  sat  in  the  big  tent  near  the  pulpit.  Mr.  Hoge  and 
daughters  came  in  near  the  door.  I  spoke  out,  *'  Mr.  Hoge,  you 
and  your  daughters  will  have  to  leave.  We  are  very  particular 
what  company  we  have  here."  They  ran  very  quickly.  The  elders 
laughed,  and  so  did  the  Conference.  It  did  good  in  many  ways. 
One  of  the  darkest  ministers,  Lynch,  said,  I  had  done  them  great 
good,  especially  in  asking  one  of  them  to  join  in  the  ordination  of 
the  ministers.  The  story  ran  through  the  Conference,  and  the  bit- 
terest of  them  felt  the  force  of  truth. 

I  feel  that  the  Lord  led  me  in  these  Conferences,  and  that  he  did 

some  good  through  so  unworthy  a  servant.    Glory  to  him  ! 

18* 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Sometimes  Mr.  Haven  drew  such  pictures  of  South- 
ern society  and  life  as  provoked  the  taunt  from  South- 
ern hps  that  they  were  of  impure  tendency.  This  was 
true  in  particular  of  the  articles  which  he  wrote  in 
respect  to  the  practical  results  of  the  illicit  relations 
which  once  existed  between  slave  women  and  their 
owners.  He  told  a  friend  that  a  man  whom  he  held  in 
the  greatest  esteem  and  respect  had  thus  denounced  him, 
and  he  said  it  as  a  man  might  announce  that  he  had  been 
charged  with  murder.  Let  us  see  his  worst  offense  of 
this  kind  : 

THE  TINTED  VENUSES. 

But  there's  a  new  anti-Boston.  Not  so  anti,  either ;  a  Boston 
which  out-Bostons  Boston.  That  radical  old  town  is  far  more  rad- 
ical in  fame  than  in  fact,  for  a  heroic  deed  it  has  never  as  a  city  done, 
since  it  became  a  city,  neither  in  the  interests  of  antislavery  nor 
anti-rum.  This  old  and  aristocratic  Charleston  does  put  on  a  new 
life.  Its  harbor  may  be  sailless,  its  streets  lifeless,  yet  it  has  a  life 
exceeding  that  of  any  other  city,  a  life  of  man  not  less  than  ideas. 
I  can  pardon  a  little  to  the  devil  of  slavery  when  I  see  what  fine 
specimens  of  humanity  it  produced.  If  you  wish  to  see  the  coming 
race  in  all  its  virile  perfection,  come  to  this  city.  Here  is  amalgama- 
tion made  perfect.  Let  none  of  my  Southern  brethren  object  to  this 
truth  of  the  Gospel,  not  even  he  of  "The  Holston  Methodist,"  who 
seems  beyond  all  price,  though  only  Price,  as  a  defender  of  the  old 
and  cold,  and  an  assailant  of  the  new  and  true.  Come  with  me, 
good  editor,  for  you  are  a  good  editor',  however  bad  an  advocate  of 
bad  things,  come  with  me  to  Meeting  Street,  and  see  these  "  blue- 
blooded  niggers,"  as  you  love  to  call  them.  What  exquisite  tints 
of  delicate  brown  ;  what  handsome  features  ;  what  beautiful  eyes ; 
what  graceful  forms !  No  boorish  Hanoverian  blood,  but  the  best 
Plantagenet.    Here  are  your  Pinckneys  ctnd  M'Gills.    I  have  met 


Bishop  Haven. 


419 


those  very  names  in  these  handsome  forms  and  faces.  Here  are 
your  Rhetts,  Barnwells,  and  Calhouns,  and  all  other  lordly  bloods. 
The  best  old  Beacon  Street  wine  of  humanity  is  theirs,  and  soars  to 
the  rich  quality  that  flashes  in  these  eyes  and  veins  and  figures. 

It  is  an  improved  breed,  the  best  the  country  has  to-day.  It  will 
be  so  reckoned  in  the  boudoirs  of  Newport  and  the  court  of  Wash- 
ington ere  many  years.  Well,  anti-Boston  did  beat  Boston  there. 
Dr.  Nehemiah  Adams  said  that  if  the  sin  of  the  North  were  stamped 
upon  its  offspring  by  a  detective  complexion,  it  might  produce  as 
visible  results  as  the  sin  of  the  South  has.  True  ;  as  visible,  per- 
haps, but  not  so  beautiful  results.  The  sanctity  of  the  mother  re- 
deemed her  child  from  the  sin  of  its  father.  It  was  not  mutual 
sin  and  shame,  as  is  all  Boston  and  Northern  lust,  which  cannot 
breed  beauty  or  character  of  comeliness  ;  it  was  violent  and  cult- 
ivated lordliness,  trampling  Christian  sweetness  under  its  lustful 
feet,  and  God  gave  these  still  untarnished  souls  an  offspring  after 
their  virgin  souls  and  not  after  the  hellish  spirits  of  their  fathers  and 
owners.  Some  of  these  tinted  Venuses  are  said  to  be  favorites 
of  their  late  masters.  Such  favoritism  often  speaks  better  for  their 
taste  than  for  their  morals.  Let  the  white  gentleman  make  the  less 
white  lady  his  wife,  and  let  her  not  degrade  herself  by  any  voluntary 
associations  of  sin.  Her  mother's  purity  can  never  be  transmitted 
in  guilty  relations.  The  lighter  are  not  always  the  more  lovely. 
Some  quite  dark  skins  are  very  rich  in  tone,  and  "  black  but  come- 
ly "  is  not  an  unknown  trait  in  Charleston.  One  knows  not  but  the 
blackest  is  of  the  best  blood,  for  pureness  of  Africanism  does  not  go 
according  to  color.  The  best  old  family  stock  is  in  these  shapely 
features,  that  are  as  black  as  Erebus. 

Now  let  our  kind  "  Holston  "  snapper  curse  these  godless  violators 
of  God's  law,  and  not  those  who  approve  its  righteous  marital  ex- 
pression. No  Southern  man  of  the  old  school  dare  look  in  the  face 
a  believer  in  the  absolute  oneness  of  mankind  and  deny  the  truth- 
fulness of  that  Word  of  God.  No  one  of  them  dare  write  an  hon- 
est editorial,  on  his  knees  before  his  Christ,  and  find  a  word  of  fault 
with  these  truth-utterers. 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Of  course,  Mr.  Price,  of  ''The  Holston  Methodist," 
did  not  fail  to  open  his  batteries  on  the  man  who  could 
write  and  pubHsh  such  things  concerning  the  union  of 
whites  and  blacks  in  such  intimate  relations.  As  an 
answer  to  Price's  lively  comments  Bishop  Haven  sent  a 
long  epistle  to  that  journal  headed,  "A  Few  Facts  and 
Principles."  We  quote  what  may  clear  up  the  issue 
and  show  the  real  aim  and  spirit  of  the  condemned 
articles.    He  says : 

The  real  question  is  simply  and  solely  whether  the  Bible  doctrine 
of  the  absolute  oneness  of  the  human  race  is  true  or  not ;  whether 
Christ  is  the  elder  brother  of  all  humanity,  or  only  of  a  proud  and 
petty  portion  thereof ;  whether  all  came  from  one  father  and  mother 
who  lived  in  Eden  and  another  father  and  mother  who  were  saved 
in  the  ark.  For  whether  we  be  of  Ham,  Japheth,  or  Shem,  the 
reputed  order  of  their  birth,  matters  not,  if  we  are  of  the  family  of 
Noah.  We  are  still  cousins  at  but  the  second  remove,  and  no  one 
is  averse  to  that  kindred  as  such,  but  rather  the  contrary.  We  are 
brothers  in  the  higher  relation,  and  one  in  the  highest. 

What  is  true  of  our  scriptural  kinship  must  be  true  in  all  its 
results.  We  cannot  afifirm  the  unity  of  the  race,  and  still  deny  its 
common,  perfect,  and  indissoluble  brotherhood.  We  cannot  accept 
the  histories  of  Adam  and  Noah  as  verities,  and  not  accept  the  negro 
as  being  as  completely  our  brother  as  the  Englishman.  We  cannot 
be  Christians,  and  not  adopt,  with  all  our  hearts,  this  truth  of  truths. 
A  late  editor  in  your  Church  and  one  of  the  ablest  in  the  country, 
a  born  writer  and  leader.  Dr.  Thomas  E.  Bond,  in  a  discourse  de- 
livered at  Wesleyan  University,  points  his  most  brilliant  sarcasms 
and  weights  his  heaviest  argument  against  the  abomination  which 
separates  the  Afric-blooded  man  from  all  his  brethren,  whether  in 
the  kingdom  of  nature  or  of  grace. 

It  was  to  defend  this  law  of  man  and  God  that  the  words  were 
v.ritten  which  3'ou  so  generously  publish,  and  more  generously  con- 


Bishop  Haven. 


421 


demn.  It  was  in  rebuke  of  the  antichristian  and  antihuman  false- 
hood of  caste  that  that  true  description  and  discussion  were  penned. 
The  argument  was  largely  in  the  shape  of  portraiture,  but  it  was 
none  the  less  an  argument.  It  described  members  of  a  class  of  our 
fellow-men  who  are  treated  to-day,  in  all  this  land,  with  unspeak- 
able contempt  and  contumely,  simply  because  of  slight  complexional 
differences  from  their  own  blood  relatives  and  near  of  kin.  I  said, 
in  substance,  that  they  appeared  modest  and  maidenly,  modest  and 
emotional,  modest  and  manly.  Do  they  not  ?  I  merely  declared 
that  no  one  dared  to  write  upon  his  knees  before  Christ  an  editorial 
and  find  fault  with  those  who  approve  the  righteous  marital  expres- 
sion which  this  state  of  things  suggests  and  demands.  .  .  , 

It  was  to  show  my  old  neighbors  the  folly  of  this  prejudice  in  the 
light  of  former  Southern  hfe  by  that  true  and  exact  picture  of 
Southern  amalgamation.  I  did  not  suppose  I  should  awaken  the 
ire  of  my  new  neighbors.  Nor  do  I  think,  judging  from  your  good- 
natured  remarks,  that  I  have  aroused  it  in  any  special  degree.  You 
do  not  object  in  your  editorial  to  the  legal  and  proper  relations  of 
these  mixed  bloods  with  the  whites.  You  only  affirm  that  the  for- 
mer relation  was  not  usually  sinless  on  either  side.  I  said  that  it 
was  sinless  on  one  side  in  some  cases.  .  .  . 

The  demon  of  caste  which  sets  us  wickedly  at  variance  with  our 
brother  is  rebuked  and  annihilated  by  this  offspring  of  our  common 
blood  and  language,  whose  fathers,  but  for  a  godless  law,  would 
have  often  gladly  recognized  them  as  children.  An  eminent  exam- 
ple of  this  was  Richard  M.  Johnson,  of  Kentucky,  Vice-President  of 
the  United  States.  He  brought  up  the  children  of  his  bond  woman 
as  tenderly  as  any  gentleman  ever  raised  his  daughters.  And  when 
a  minister  refused  their  mother  the  sacrament  because  she  was  living 
unlawfully,  he  said  to  her,  "  My  dear,  go  and  ask  the  clergyman  to 
come  and  marry  us  this  very  night."  The  minister  refused  to  perform 
the  ceremony.  The  law  forbade  it.  Which  was  the  greatest  sia- 
ner,  the  law  or  the  lover  ? 

I  commend  no  one  for  the  least  offense  against  the  law  of  God. 
But  what  shall  be  said  of  a  State  which  still  enacts  such  Christless 


422 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


laws  ?  They  are  operative  to-day  all  over  the  land,  except  three 
States  in  the  South,  and  about  an  equal  number  in  the  North.  De- 
nounce them,  as  you  love  Christ  and  represent  his  Church,  and  seek 
the  purification  of  society.  You  say,  "  These  views  will  yet  prevail 
in  that  Church."  Thank  God  for  that  expectation  !  May  he  hasten 
the  day  !  It  has  already  arrived.  In  many  a  Conference  and  in  not 
a  few  Churches  through  the  South  and  North,  the  Methodist  Epis- 
copal Church  is  faithful  to  the  spirit  of  this  central  truth  of  the 
Gospel.  In  her  Discipline  she  has  but  one  blot.  In  her  adminis- 
tration she  has  not  one.  But  I  can  reciprocate  your  welcome  proph- 
ecy.   The  Church  South  is  certain  to  embrace  this  same  truth. 

Your  political  leaders,  through  desires  for  immense  voting  powers 
from  the  hands  of  their  brethren  of  color,  will  abandon  all  the  false 
fancies  of  distinctions  among  men,  as  men.  I  was  introduced  to  the 
Governor  of  Georgia  by  a  colored  gentleman,  and  no  northern  poli- 
tician in  like  office  would  have  treated  such  a  gentleman  so  heartily 
as  Governor  Smith  did  this  clergyman.  Why.^  Because  he  repre- 
sented one  hundred  thousand  votes,  almost  half  the  whole  voting 
population.  Another  colored  gentleman  introduced  me  to  another 
white  governor  with  like  cordiality  on  the  part  of  the  official.  A  white 
minister  introduced  me  to  a  colored  governor,  who  was  at  that  mo- 
ment in  intimate  conversation  with  a  former  eminent  and  eloquent 
minister  of  your  Church,  one  of  his  most  active  supporters,  and  still, 
for  aught  I  know,  one  of  your  members.  I  saw  no  caste  in  these 
political  associations.  .  .  .  Every  vestige  of  that  barbarism  must 
disappear  before  the  shinings  of  the  Holy  Spirit  in  humanity.  May 
your  Journal  assist  this  abolition  ! 

Among  all  his  reports  of  the  doings  of  the  Southern 
Conferences  under  review  one  of  the  best  illustrations 
of  the  state  of  the  ecclesiastical  South  is  his  account  of  a 

CONFERENCE  IN  A  TENT. 
Many's  the  odd  place  in  which  a  Conference  has  been  held.    In  a 
kitchen  was  the  New  York  Conference  one?  assembled.    But  I  think 


Bishop  Haven. 


423 


it  was  a  new  sensation  that  saw  the  Alabama  Conference  under  a 
tent.    True,  it  began  its  convocation  under  a  different  sort  of  a  roof 

 a  rude  structure  of  rough  boards,  with  large  chinks  between  ;  with 

holes  for  windows  and  doors,  but  nothing  filling  them  ;  with  sawed 
slabs  for  benches,  and  a  very  leaky  roof.    Such  was  the  spot. 

Across  a  wood  path  and  small  opening  in  the  forest  rises,  on  the 
edge  of  the  woods,  the  large  tabernacle,  the  gift  of  Cincinnati  breth- 
ren, which  m.oves  over  this  country  as  the  first  tabernacle  did  about 
the  wilderness,  and,  like  that,  bears  the  Shekinah  to  all  places 
whithersoever  it  goeth.  Like  that,  too,  it  is  still  spoken  against  by 
the  Moabites,  and  other  cousins  who  dislike  to  behold  this  moving 
pillar  of  cloud  and  pillar  of  fire,  and  to  witness  the  multitudes  that 
throng  its  solemn  feasts.  Not  one  single  thing  or  thought  has  done 
more  for  us  than  this  tent  of  the  Lord. 

The  scenery  around  our  unkempt  chapel  is  not  less  interesting. 
Here  is  a  valley  a  couple  of  miles  broad,  "  be  the  same  more  or 
less,"  with  not  lofty  and  not  lowly  hills  inclosing  it.  This  valley  is 
laid  down  to  corn  and  cotton,  the  former  chiefly,  and  is  lined  on 
either  side  with  the  cottages  of  the  planters.  The  hills  are  covered 
thick  with  woods,  and  the  woods  thick  with  flowers..  Nowhere  does 
the  American  forest  appear  more  magnificent. 

"  O  with  what  glory  comes  and  goes  the  year  ! " 

one  exclaims  with  Longfellow,  as  we  gaze  on  these  waves  of  red  and 
green  and  yellow  of  every  shade,  rolling  in  quiet  fullness  along  the 
sides  of  this  cultured  hollow.  Better  yet,  and  a  sight  unseen  by 
Northern  eyes,  this  blossoming  of  the  woods  is  attended  with  the 
blossoming  of  gardens.  June  roses  are  blooming  in  the  yard,  while 
November  roses  are  blooming  on  the  mountains.  You  don't  see 
that  often  on  the  Hudson  or  Connecticut,  or  Susquehanna  even.  It 
is  not  frost,  but  ripeness  turns  the  leaf.  The  ripeness  is  perpetually 
renewed  in  the  rosebush,  but  has  only  one  season  in  the  maple.  So 
the  orchard  blooms  of  spring  are  offset  by  the  forest  blooms  of  Oc- 
tober— each  All   .  J   11  » 

AH  at  once  and  all  o  er, 

as  the  Falls  of  Lodore. 


424 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Inside  our  ecclesiastical  shanty  the  sight  is  most  interesting. 
Here  are  gathered  nigh  a  hundred  ministers,  all,  with  one  or  two 
exceptions,  natives  of  Alabama  or  the  Gulf  region  ;  all,  with  no  ex- 
ceptions, sufferers  for  their  country  and  the  Church  of  Christ.  Here 
are  venerated  fathers,  who  held  high  places  in  the  Church  South. 
They  are  valiant  Union  men,  who  know  what  it  is  to  endure  afflic- 
tions and  distresses  for  their  faith.  Dr.  Miller,  one  of  this  sort,  was 
entreated  by  Dr.  Hamilton,  once  a  famous  Boston  preacher,  not  to 
desert  his  old  home.  Our  good  Brother  Miller  brings  his^  family 
with  him,  one  brother  and  two  sons  being  members  of  this  Con- 
ference. 

That  graceful,  genial  gentleman  of  years  and  culture,  also  once 
high  in  rival  councils,  but  now  knitted  heart  and  soul  with  us,  is  Dr. 
Franklin.  He  is  of  a  gentle  spirit,  yet  firm  as  a  mountain  of  rocks 
to  his  principles  and  his  "  boys."  He  has  charge  chiefly  of  breth- 
ren of  the  "  colored  persuasion,"  and  his  pet  and  pride  is  that  tall, 
black,  comely  youth,  so  cleanly  and  neatly  dressed,  with  spark- 
ling linen  that  would  make  most  gentlemen  sigh  for  his  laundress — 
W.  O.  Lynch.  He  was  a  favorite  house  slave  of  the  doctor's  neigh- 
bor's, and  his  favorite  brother  to-day.  He  deserves  it,  too.  He  acts 
as  secretar)'  of  the  District  Conference,  and  acts  well,  being  a  good 
writer  and  an  apt  student.  His  wife  helps  him  with  her  washing,  of 
which  his  own  linen  is  an  illustrious  example,  and  he  also  teaches 
school,  and  attends  school  while  faithfully  superintending  a  large 
Church.    Surely  such  a  worker  will  win. 

Here  is  a  tall,  venerable  man  of  seventy  and  over,  stooping  with 
years  a  little,  but  still  endowed  with  great  preaching  force — Brother 
Cole.  And  another,  hardly  younger,  not  stooping  yet  at  all,  more 
popular  still,  and  good  for  many  years — Dr.  Jones,  of  Irondale,  who, 
almost  alone  of  all  the  members  on  his  side  of  the  house,  appears 
arrayed  in  broadcloth  complete,  the  gift  of  a  Pennsylvanian  iron 
manufacturer  where  he  preaches — Brother  Thomas,  late  of  Lehigh- 
ton.  He  is  one  of  the  most  enterprising  of  our  Northern  allies,  and 
one  who  sticks  to  the  Church  with  all  his  heart  and  purse  and  head. 
I  put  these  words  in  their  proper  order. 


Bishop  Haven. 


425 


The  general  apparel  is  yet  largely  of  the  homespun  sort,  especially 
in  the  nether  garments,  which  certainly  look  warm  and  cleanly,  and 
show  how  wisely  our  brethren  adapt  themselves  to  their  estate. 
Preachers  and  people  are  alike  in  this  style  of  dress.  But  the  young 
folks  come  out  in  city  hats,  flowers,  and  feminine  fantastics  as  gor- 
geously as  the  autumn  foliage.  The  old  folks  make  the  necessary 
butternut  background  to  their  brilliance. 

There  is  the  presiding  elder  of  this  district.  Brother  Parker,  a  wise, 
genial  man,  who  knows  too  much  to  wear  to  the  Conference  the  new 
suit  Brother  Thomas  gave  him.  It  would  have  ruined  him  among 
his  fellows.  And  Brother  Self,  another  of  the  same  sort,  with  the 
calm,  strong  sense  of  that  order,  whose  dress  is  like  the  people's  he 
serves  so  well. 

This  Brother  Louis,  "  black  as  your  hat,"  if  it  be  of  a  dark-brown 
tint,  dresses  up  to  the  city  fashion.  He  is  a  well-built,  muscular 
Christian,  dressed  in  a  heavy  overcoat — too  heavy,  one  would  judge, 
for  this  weather — a  shining  hat,  and  handsome  apparel.  His  pre- 
siding eldership  is  a  success.  His  ministers  trust  in  him,  and  the 
Conference  also.  Close  by  him  sits  another,  not  less  dark,  nor  less 
compactly  built,  who  has  seen  and  suffered  much  for  liberty.  He 
was  the  special  object  of  hate  by  the  Ku  Klux,  and  when  they  raged 
at  his  brethren  through  Tuscumbia,  they  especially  sought  his  life. 
By  almost  a  miracle — by  an  actual  and  visible  Providence — he  made 
his  escape.  They  caught  six  of  his  brethren,  and  hung  them  to  the 
bars  of  a  bridge,  and  for  him  they  substituted  an  effigy ;  so  that  he 
is  as  one  raised  from  the  dead,  whence  also  his  brethren  receive  him 
as  in  a  figure.  He  escaped  from  his  murderers  across  an  open  field, 
and  by  the  very  railroad  train  that  passed  over  his  murdered  kins- 
folk. To-day  he  is  sent  over  the  same  region  a  presiding  elder,  es- 
tablishing the  Church  against  which  these  garroters  especially  foamed 
and  fought. 

Here  is  another.  White  in  name  and  complexion,  but  of  the  same 
faith,  hope,  and  love,  who  has  also  seen  and  suffered  for  the  common 
cause.  He  describes  the  horrible  massacre  of  a  youth  near  his 
present  residence,  whom  these  hounds  of  hell  seized,  cut  out  the 


426 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


small  bone  of  his  forearm,  and  otherwise  maltreated  alive ;  shot 
sixteen  balls  into  him,  and  buried  him  in  a  swamp  hole  with  the 
burial  of  a  dog.  He  will  have  the  resurrection  of  an  angel.  The 
wife  of  a  Baptist  minister  saw  part  of  the  hellish  deed,  and  told  his 
friends  where  he  lay.  For  this  little  information  they  ran  her  and 
her  husband  out  of  the  country.  And  this  is  the  people  who 
would  still  ravage,  tear,  and  slay  their  brethren,  but  for  the  strong 
arm  of  Grant.  They  still  breathe  out  threatenings  and  slaughter. 
They  carry  elections  in  Virginia  by  feeding  hot  this  ancient  grudge. 
They  write  and  speak  in  Alabama  equally  detestable  sentiments 
against  their  own  kinsfolk  of  any  color,  who  are  loyal  to  the  flag, 
and  to  freedom,  and  to  humanity,  and  to  Christ ;  and  they  are  sup- 
ported too  largely  by  the  Church,  so  called,  of  Jesus  Christ. 

"Alas  for  the  rarity 
Of  Christian  charity, 
Under  this  sun." 

These  brethren  are  a  unit  against  these  wrongs  and  evils  of  every 
sort,  and  are  almost  the  only  representatives  of  the  true  Church. 
Though  not  yet  advanced  to  all  the  fullness  of  truth  in  all  its  forms, 
they  are  accepters  of  it  in  all  its  seeds,  germs,  and  principles.  They 
will  embrace  it  in  all  the  practices  that  necessarily  follow. 

It  will  not  do  to  close  this  catalogue  of  our  heroes  without  mention 
of  the  chief — he  who  is  the  father  and  founder  of  the  Conference.  It 
was  said  by  a  wise  listener  at  our  late  General  Conference  that  there 
must  be  one  very  remarkable  genius  among  its  members,  for  he  was 
found  on  almost  every  committee,  and  was  always  the  chairman 
thereof.  This  happened  because  the  committees  were  elected  one 
from  each  Conference,  and  Alabama  headed  the  roll.  Yet  it  was 
not  altogether  without  cause  that  such  a  coincidence  occurred,  for 
A.  S.  Lakin  is  in  no  undeserving  sense  the  head  of  our  Church 
work  in  the  South,  which,  of  course,  makes  him  the  head  of  the 
General  Conference ;  for  no  one  of  our  brethren  here  has  done  or 
suffered  so  much  for  the  Church  and  nation  as  he.  Coming  into 
the  country  as  soon  as  the  war  opened  the  way, -fighting  his  way 


Bishop  Haven. 


437 


hither  at  the  head  of  the  armies,  as  a  clerical  co-worker  with  Sher- 
man and  Thomas,  he  planted  the  banner  of  the  Church  as  soon  as 
they  did  that  of  the  Nation.  He  has  been  "run  out  "  of  more  than 
one  county  by  the  Ku  Klux ;  has  been  plotted  against  as  often  as 
Paul  was  by  the  Jews,  and  as  unsuccessfully ;  has  had  a  price  set  on 
his  head ;  has  been  honored  with  innumerable  newspaper  assaults, 
and  yet  is  a  terror  to  evil-doers  and  a  praise  to  them  that  do  well. 
He  got  the  Conference  together  in  1867,  and  has  been  its  secretary 
and  all  in  all  since  that  time.  The  hearts  of  his  brethren  trust  in 
him,  and  though  the  enemy  ceases  not  to  assail,  the  friends  form  a 
triple  wall  of  brass  about  him.  He  is  said  to  be  the  best  stump 
speaker  in  the  State,  and  is  as  full  of  tropes  as  Beecher,  or  Spurgeon, 
or  Longfellow,  though,  like  the  last,  he  sometimes  gets  the  figures 
mixed  in  the  affluence  of  his  fancy.  He  can  be  all  things  to  all  men 
— the  darks  being  devoted  to  him,  and  the  lights  holding  him  in  warm 
regard.  He  balances  contraries  with  contraries  as  keenly  as  any  other 
manager  of  men  and  things,  and  if  he  has  a  secretary',  which  he  may 
yet  find  in  Brothers  Lynch  and  Brashear,  to  relieve  him  of  drudgery 
he  loathes,  he  will  not  lose  his  hold  on  the  child  he  has  created  for 
many  a  day  to  come.  His  courage  and  wisdom  are  both  pledges  of 
success  in  his  labors  of  love. 

The  Conference  has  held  its  Sabbath  and  Monday  services  in  the 
big  tent.  An  immense  audience  filled  it  Sabbath  morning,  pouring 
in  for  miles  around.  A  full  house  attended  its  last  session,  and 
drank  in  the  novel  spectacle  in  this  countr}-  of  all  men  being  treated 
as  equals.  There  is  yet  something  to  be  learned  of  this  truth  in  the 
North  as  well  as  the  South,  and  it  is  not  unlikely  the  South  will  get 
her  lesson  learned  first  and  best.  These  ordinations,  in  their  alpha, 
betical  and  proper  order,  assisted  by  all  the  brethren  in  the  presid- 
ing eldership,  are  no  small  sign  of  a  return  to  the  first  scriptural 
ordination — that  which  separated  Paul  and  Barnabas  for  their  life- 
work,  in  which,  by  direction  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  one  of  the  imposi- 
tionists  was  "  Simeon  called  Niger,"  (the  "i"  is  pronounced  short 
and  "  g  "  hard  here,  after  the  true  classic  fashion.) 

There  have  been  some  amusing  instances  of  fears  lest  the  whole 


428 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


social  fabric  would  be  turned  topsy-turvy  if  any  variation  from  the 
dead  letter  of  past  caste  was  indulged  in. 

"  Strange  horrors  seized  them,  and  pangs  unfelt  before," 

at  this  dread  possibility.  But  nobody  found  any  chance  to  indulge 
the  fears  he  feared,  and  the  Church  moves  on  her  way,  melting  all 
together  in  love  and  labor  and  life.  They  get  used  to  nicknames 
and  rather  like  them.  They  will  not  be  scared  nor  scolded  nor 
insulted  out  of  the  Church  by  any  epithets,  but  wear  them  proudly, 
as  true  men  always  do.  Alabama  will  yet  be  a  land  of  rest,  as  she 
is  rightly  called,  for  all  her  children. 

We  have  seen  that  Mr.  Haven  practiced  that  doctrine 
of  political  and  social  equality  which  he  had  so  urgently 
taught  as  one  of  the  chief  duties  of  the  Church  in  our 
times.  One  of  the  most  novel  and  interesting  phases 
of  his  episcopal  life  was  revealed  in  his  effort  to  carry 
out  the  same  line  of  conduct  in  his  work  in  the  South. 
He  made  friends  so  readily  that  hardly  another  North- 
ern clergyman  could  have  gained  so  much  general  in- 
fluence, personal  and  social,  as  he  did  under  the  same 
circumstances.  His  Journal  abounds  with  incidents  of 
this  sort.  We  give  an  account  of  his  meeting  Governor 
Brown,  of  Georgia,  as  an  illustration  : 

Met  Governor  Brown  and  Commissioner  Delano.  Had  a  long 
talk  that  evening,  and  several  the  next  day  with  Brown.  He  was  a 
leading  Confederate,  but  accepted  the  situation  when  the  war 
ended.  He  said  he  called  his  slaves  together  when  Sherman  crowded 
on  North  Georgia,  and  told  them  he  had  a  plantation  in  Southern 
Georgia  ;  that  they  could  go  there  or  stay  here.  If  they  went  down 
there  they  would  be  slaves  if  the  South  conquered  ;  if  they  stayed 
they  would  be  free.  They  all  went  and  worked  that  summer,  only 
stipulating  that  he  should  bring  them  ba^k  when  the  war  was  over 


Bishop  Haven. 


429 


They  had  great  faith  in  the  result.  When  the  war  was  over  he 
divided  the  crop  between  himself  and  them  and  took  them  all  back. 

He  says  cotton  is  still  profitable  and  the  negroes  make  as  good 
workmen,  though  free,  as  they  did  before.  He  was  very  cordial,  and 
promised  to  call  on  me  when  I  return  to  Atlanta.    Another  gain. 

How  deftly  he  knew  how  to  touch  the  rebel  heart  is 
told  in  a  story  of  his  wanderings  in  the  Georgia  hill 
country. 

We  came  to  a  deep-shaded  homestead,  with  a  large  yard  full  of 
large  trees  and  bee-hives,  a  rivulet  dashing  through  it,  and  the  beds 
and  truck  all  out  doors,  the  spring  "  scalding  and  scrubbing,"  as 
they  say,  going  on.  A  goodly  lady  is  petitioned  for  milk,  but  none 
comes.  Water  is  supplied,  and  even  the  bucket  is  called  for  before 
the  meal  is  finished.  So  we  draw  near  her  placid  majesty,  as  she 
sits  between  the  house  and  the  kitchen,  in  the  most  cool  and  shady 
and  breezy  spot  at  her  command,  and  proceed  to  interview.  Her 
boy  has  found  us  out,  and  asks  if  he  did  not  hear  us  preach  last 
summer  at  the  camp-ground,  near  twenty  miles  away  ?  "  Yes."  So 
we  are  already  known. 

"  What  Church  do  you  belong  to  ?  "  is  asked. 

"  The  Methodist  Church,  South,"  is  the  short  reply. 

"  We  both  joined  the  same  Church,  I  reckon  ?  " 

"  If  you  joined  the  Methodist  Church,  South,  we  did." 

"  I  joined  the  Church  in  '39  ;  when  did  you  join  ?  " 

"  I  don't  remember." 

"  That's  strange.    Most  Methodists  remember  that  event." 
"They  ought  to,  if  they  have  much  religion,"  she  replies. 
The  editor  struck  in,  "  I  joined  in  '42." 
"  So  did  I,"  responded  madam. 

"  Then  we  all  joined  the  same  Church,"  is  the  triumphant  conclud- 
ing remark. 

We  chatted  on  other  themes,- and  left  the  lady  "  weakened  "  a 
little,  perhaps,  by  the  unexpected  recall  to  her  memory  that  her 


430  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


Church  beginning  was  with  that  which  she  evidently  wasn't  yet 
ready  to  fraternize  with.  Our  return  trip  gave  us  a  goodly  welcome 
from  host  and  hostess,  and  a  right  nice  dinner.  So  fraternization 
grew  from  what  it  fed  on. 

While  he  was  so  cordially  received  by  all  classes  of 
citizens  who  came  into  personal  relations  with  him,  he 
had  a  peculiarly  warm  greeting  from  the  colored  people. 
He  was  their  Bishop,  the  ardent  defender  of  all  their 
rights,  the  champion  who  made  his  voice  heard  in  all 
the  land  when  any  privilege  of  theirs  was  withheld. 
He  visited  them  in  their  homes,  shared  their  hospital- 
ity, treated  them  as  free  and  honorable  men,  and  loved 
them  as  servants  and  disciples  of  the  Lord  Jesus.  He 
took  a  colored  minister  with  him  into  the  dining  room 
of  a  Southern  hotel.  The  clerk  put  them  into  a  separ- 
ate and  disagreeable  position  to  eat  their  dinner.  Mr. 
Haven  protested  against  the  indignity  with  great  ardor. 
But  the  clerk,  while  admitting  that  he  was  bound  to 
receive  the  novel  guest,  asserted  that  he  was  entitled  to 
seat  the  guests  according  to  his  pleasure.  Appeal  was 
made  to  the  landlord,  who  said  to  the  reluctant  clerk, 
"  Seat  these  gentlemen  where  they  wish." 

In  one  instance  a  colored  minister,  conversing  with 
the  Bishop,  was  rudely  ordered  to  another  car  by 
a  somewhat  surly  conductor.  At  another  time  the 
brave  Bishop  was  himself  ordered  to  leave  the  col- 
ored people's  car,  where  he  was  in  conversation  with  a 
negro.  In  some  cases  the  ladies  of  the  households 
where  he  was  entertained  were  unwilling  to  have  the 
colored  ministers  enter  their  parlors  and  sitting-rooms 


Bishop  Haven. 


431 


on  the  same  terms  as  the  rest.  Such  rude  conduct  al- 
ways moved  his  soul  with  the  bitterest  indignation,  and 
made  him  more  than  ever  careful  to  show  all  such  vic- 
tims even  more  than  his  wonted  courtesy.  His  Journal 
mentions  the  fact  that  a  colored  gentleman  on  a  certain 
occasion  asked  the  Bishop  to  take  a  drive  with  him 
about  the  town.  He  excused  himself  because  he  was 
sadly  fatigued  and  worn  out.  But  something  led  him 
to  fancy  that  either  the  gentleman  himself  or  his  ac- 
quaintances would  see  in  the  act  a  refusal  to  associate 
with  a  respectable  colored  man.  He  reproached  himself 
in  the  sharpest  way  for  his  own  want  of  forethought, 
and  resolved  to  make  special  exertion  to  hinder  that 
construction  of  his  act.  Such  doings  were  only  a  con- 
tinuation of  practices  which  had  marked  his  entire  life, 
and  he  would  have  held  that  he  had  forfeited  all  title  to 
the  Christian  name  if  he  had  relaxed  his  zeal  in  them. 

These  acts  of  genuine  fraternity  found  their  natural 
coronation  in  1874  in  a  scene  which  "  The  Atlanta  Con- 
stitution "  announced  to  the  public  in  these  terms : 

But  few  men  of  the  Northern  Church  have  been  so  talked  of  in 
late  years  as  Bishop  Haven,  on  account  of  his  pronounced  and  re- 
peatedly asserted  views  on  the  subject  of  the  colored  race.  Many 
remarks  attributed  to  him  have  circulated  through  the  press  all  over 
the  country,  which  may  or  may  not  be  true.  Among  others  is  the 
one  that  he  hoped  to  live  long  enough  to  see  a  negro  in  the  presi- 
dential chair.  Many  such  reports  are  exaggerated,  but  one  thing  is 
quite  certain,  Bishop  Haven  is  a  radical  extremist  on  the  subject  of 
our  colored  "  friend  and  brother."  He  has  been  sojourning  in  At- 
lanta for  some  days  in  discharge  of  his  duties,  and  while  here  an 
incident  has  occurred  which  places  him  in  the  foremost  ranks  of  the 


432 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


civil  rights'  hosts,  entitling  him  to  the  highest  claims  for  leadership. 
He  is  a  public  man,  and  his  acts  as  well  as  views  upon  the  great 
political  and  social  questions  agitating  the  country  are  matters  of 
public  interest  which  should  be  giv^en  to  the  people.  We  lay  before 
our  readers  a  most  notable  incident  of  his  stay  in  Atlanta. 

A  few  days  since  it  came  to  our  ears  from  a  gentleman  in  this 
city  that  somebody  had  said  to  him  that  he  had  heard  that  some- 
body had  said  that  "  Bishop  Haven  had  taken  supper  with  a  negro." 
So  we  went  for  that  item,  and  our  reporter  after  some  difficulty  and 
delay  worked  it  up. 

The  fortunate  African  was  Dr.  Badger,  a  worthy  colored  dentist 
of  this  city.  Having  first  posted  himself  pretty  thoroughly,  the  re- 
porter sought  confirmation.  He  was  glad  to  find  that  the  individual 
so  blessed  was  not  at  all  willing  to  take  the  suggestion  based  on 
the  famous  remark  of  Bob  Tombs  to  a  gentleman  as  to  the  time 
"he  ought  to  have  died."  Our  colored  brother  has  had  "glory 
enough  for  one  day,"  but  he  evidently  wants  more  days  with  or 
without  the  glory. 

Stumbling  into  a  pleasant  and  comfortable  dental  office,  (by 
chance,  of  course,)  the  reporter  went  at  it  thusly  : 

"  Why,  how  are  you.  Badger  }  is  this  your  office  ?  " 

"  Certainly,"  he  replied  ;  "  I  have  been  here  a  long  time. 

"  How  are  you  getting  on  ?  " 

"  Very  good,  indeed  ;  my  business  is  good,  thanks  to  many  white 
friends." 

"  Glad  to  hear  it.  And,  by  the  way,  you  had  a  distinguished  honor 
the  other  night  as  well." 

"You  look  here,"  said  the  doctor;  "now  don't  put  that  in  the 
paper.  I  was  just  expecting  '  The  Constitution  '  to  get  hold  of  it. 
You  came  here  just  for  that." 

"  But  didn't  he  take  supper  with  you.  Badger.^  He  is  only  living 
up  to  his  principles." 

And  the  reporter,  to  be  honest,  told  him  that  he  did  come  for  the 
very  purpose  mentioned.  The  result  was  that  the  information  was 
confirmed. 


Bishop  Haven. 


433 


On  last  Friday  Bishop  Haven  took  supper  with  Badger  and  his 
family  at  their  residence.  A  young  lady,  the  Bishop's  daughter, 
with  a  small  and  very  select  party,  also  enjoyed  the  repast,  of  v^hich 
we  have  heard  that  it  was  a  sumptuous  affair,  abounding  in  dain- 
ties, rich  in  conversation,  and  sparkling  with  wit,  good  feeling,  and 
enjoyment. 

Dr.  Badger  showed  himself  a  capital  host,  and,  determined  to 
leave  no  courtesy  unperformed,  took  the  Bishop  and  his  daughter  to 
ride  in  a  carriage. 

The  Bishop  has  evidently  eclipsed  his  Northern  rivals.  He  is  far 
ahead  of  the  most  rabid  of  the  social  equality  howlers,  or  civil  right- 
ers,  which  is  almost  the  same,  but  who  are  fonder  of  preaching  than 
of  practicing.    The  Bishop  has  shown  his  faith  by  his  works. 

We  sincerely  hope  that  none  of  our  Atlanta  darkies  will  perish  for 
sheer  envy,  for  -Badger  is  deserving  of  his  good  fortune.  He  is  a 
good  dentist,  and  has  the  reputation  of  a  gentleman.  If  white  men 
court  his  society,  he  surely  can't  be  blamed  for  it.  We  don't  charge 
him  one  cent  for  this  big  advertisement,  nor  the  Bishop. 

No  act  of  his  life  cost  him  more  criticism  than  what 
the  papers  styled  Bishop  Haven's  renomination  of  Gen- 
eral Grant.    We  give  his  own  report  of  it : 

I  attended  Preachers'  Meeting  at  Grace  Church,  called  there  to 
hear  Professor  Wells'  speech  on  "  Bismarck  and  the  Pope,"  and  then 
and  there  "  fired  a  shot  heard  round  the  world."   It  was  on  this  wise  : 

The  Boston  Preachers'  Meeting  had  been  visited  several  weeks 
before  by  Rev.  Mr.  Ayres  in  the  interest  of  the  Wesley  Memorial 
Church,  at  Savannah,  Ga.  He  tried  to  get  several  to  introduce 
him,  Brother  Hamilton,  Dr.  Pierce,  Dr.  Upham.  All  refused.  At 
last,  for  form's  sake.  Dr.  Upham  introduced  him,  and  the  brother 
made  his  appeal.  A  motion  was  made  to  approve  his  enter- 
prise. The  question  was  raised  whether  he  would  allow  me  to 
preach  in  his  church.  He  said  he  could  not.  Personally  he 
had  no  objection,  but  it  could  not  be  allowed.  Likewise  with 
19 


434 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


our  colored  preachers.  They  put  an  amendment  on  the  resolve, 
"  Provided  we  be  permitted  to  preach  there."  For  four  hours 
they  discussed  it  before  a  crowded  house,  the  longest  and  most 
heated  discussion  that  meeting  ever  saw.  The  amendment  was 
laid  on  the  table  by  a  vote  of  30  to  27.  The  resolve  passed  by 
the  same  vote.  The  brethren  felt  very  sore.  A  letter  was  written 
by  Dr.  Sherman  to  the  "  Atlanta  Advocate,"  making  the  statement 
about  me.  Private  letters  were  sent  of  a  like  purport.  I  called  the 
attention  of  Brother  I.  J.  Lansing  to  it,  and  he,  being  chairman  of 
the  Committee  on  the  State  of  the  Church  at  the  Georgia  Confer- 
ence, then  in  session,  put  in  a  resolution  condemning  such  conduct 
as  a  reflection  on  the  Georgia  Conference.  That  went  back  to  Bos- 
ton.   They  had  agreed  to  give  a  memorial  window. 

Dr.  Ela  brought  up  that  vote,  then  called  for  the  reading  of  the 
resolution  of  the  Georgia  Conference,  and  a  new  war  of  words 
sprang  up.  In  the  midst  of  it  somebody  said,  "  You  invited  Bishops 
Foster  and  Wiley  to  speak  here  on  the  South  ;  you  dare  not  invite 
Bishop  Haven."  This  was  a  mistake^  for  I  had  often  been  invited 
to  speak  there  on  that  subject,  and  had  often  spoken.  They  laid  all 
other  motions  on  the  table,  and  unanimously  asked  me  to  speak  on 
the  South.  I  did  not  wish  to  do  it.  The  air  and  soil  are  too  hot 
here,  and  every  word  I  speak  is  caught  up  and  hurled  every-vvhere. 
As  I  did  not  wish  to  say  that  I  would  not,  I  sought  to  evade  it. 
The  next  Monday  after  that  was  Vice-President  Wilson's  funeral.  I 
went  to  that.  The  next  was  Professor  Wells'  speech,  and  I  thought 
that  would  let  me  off. 

I  stayed  at  Magee's  until  half  past  eleven  o'clock,  and  then  went 
to  the  church  to  see  the  brethren.  I  had  previously  told  Brother 
Hamilton,  and  Brother  Bates,  the  president,  that  I  did  not  wish  to 
speak.  But  I  was  greatly  burdened  about  the  dark  and  dreadful 
state  of  things  at  the  South.  Oppression  of  the  severest  sort — no 
political,  no  financial,  no  civil,  no  Christian  rights.  I  felt  that  if  any 
change  was  made  in  the  administration  we  should  all  be  imperiled  ; 
and  if  it  should  become  Democratic,  we  should  all  be  driven  out.  I 
also  felt  that  the  people  wanted  General  Grant  to  hold  the  position 


Bishop  Haven. 


435 


another  term,  while  the  politicians  and  the  press  were  opposed  to  it. 
Burdened  with  this  feeling,  I  thought  as  I  was  walking  to  the 
church  I  would  write  a  letter  to  the  "  Independent,"  entitled,  "  Pray 
for  the  Renomination  of  Grant,"  in  which  I  would  put  my  reasons 
and  appeals  for  such  a  duty.  I  got  to  the  Church  just  before  twelve. 
Professor  Wells  was  speaking.  I  sat  near  the  door  with  Brother 
Kendrick.  The  reporters  were  going  out.  They  asked  Brother 
Hamilton  if  I  would  speak.  He  said  I  was  not  present.  Some  one 
overheard  him,  corrected  him,  and  pointed  out  my  seat.  He  came 
to  me,  but  I  protested,  and  urged  him  not  to  tell  Brother  Bates  I 
was  there.  He  refused,  told  him,  and  in  a  few  minutes  called  me 
out.  I  went  forward,  stood  in  the  altar,  overcoat  on,  and  hat  in 
hand.  I  spoke  twenty  minutes,  and  closed  with  saying,  "  Brethren, 
pray  for  the  renomination  of  Grant."  Several,  I  don't  know  how 
many,  said  Amen  ! 

When  I  sat  down  Dr.  Sherman,  who  was  anxious  to  get  the 
Preachers'  Meeting  back  into  the  hands  of  the  twenty-seven,  moved 
a  vote  of  thanks  that  was  carried  by  a  rising  vote.  Bishop  Wiley 
declined  to  speak,  saying,  "  I  indorse  all  that  has  been  said,"  a  re- 
mark that  has  never  got  into  print. 

Bishop  Haven  did  not  for  a  moment  conjecture  what 
a  commotion  this  simple  speech  was  destined  to  stir  up. 
Rev.  J.  W.  Hamilton  said  to  him,  "  Your  speech  will 
make  a  great  stir  in  the  country."  The  Bishop  did  not 
think  so,  as  he  had  only  asked  men  to  pray  for  an  event 
which  he  deemed  essential  to  the  peace  and  welfare  of 
the  South.  He  was  slower  than  usual  in  reading  the 
signs  of  the  times.  The  papers,  and  especially  the  poli- 
ticians, were  on  the  watch  for  some  evidence  that  Gen- 
eral Grant  had  withdrawn  from  the  ranks  of  the  candi- 
dates for  the  presidency  in  the  approaching  election. 
Candidates  for  the  presidential  succession,  with  their 


43^  Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 

friends  and  allies,  had  been  keenly  disappointed  in  the 
fact  that  the  President  in  his  recent  message  had  not 
announced  or  indicated  a  purpose  to  retire  from  public 
life  at  the  close  of  his  second  term.  The  public  shared 
the  general  feeling  of  doubt  and  uncertainty  in  political 
circles.  Every  body  was  alert  for  some  hint  as  to  im- 
pending movements.  Bishop  Haven  was  so  full  of  the 
Southern  question  that  he  did  not  realize  that  the  coun- 
try was  in  a  tensely  strained  political  condition,  where 
effects  might  show  a  strange  disproportion  to  causes,  as 
a  single  clap  of  the  hands  in  the  Alps  sometimes  releases 
the  poised  avalanche. 

Some  of  the  reporters  worked  up  the  incident  with  a 
shameless  disregard  of  truth.  A  Philadelphia  paper  rep- 
resented the  meeting  as  made  up  of  six  hundred  minis- 
ters, as  being  addressed  in  a  long  and  heated  episcopal 
harangue,  at  the  end  of  which  the  Bishop  put  Grant  in 
nomination  for  a  third  time,  and  that  t  ie  meeting  in- 
dorsed the  nomination  with  great  unanimity.  These 
wild  statements  went  the  rounds  of  the  press  all  over 
the  country  in  a  very  short  time.  Tliis  report  was 
made  the  basis  of  all  sorts  of  wild  conjec  iures  and  com- 
ments. As  nearly  all  the  metropolitan  jDurnals  were  at 
work  to  defeat  the  third-term  project,  in  the  interest  of 
some  favorite  candidate,  whose  hopes  of  success  could 
not  be  very  bright  so  long  as  Grant  remained  in  the 
field,  a  concurrent  effort  was  made  to  ti.rn  this  excite- 
ment in  some  way  against  the  President.  The  newspa- 
per writers  were  anxious  to  learn  whom  Bishop  Haven 
represented  in  this  expression  of  his  views.    Were  all 


Bishop  Haven.  437 

the  Bishops  of  the  Church  like  minded  ?  Was  the  min- 
istry in  general  favorable  to  such  a  movement  ?  Was 
the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  in  America  likely  to 
be  drawn  into  the  current  of  political  maneuvering  ? 
Such  were  the  questions  which  were  seriously  asked  all 
over  the  country.  The  "  New  York  Herald  "  devoted 
four  columns  oi"  a  single  issue  to  the  purpose  of  collect- 
ing light  from  every  available  quarter  in  reference  to 
this  event.  It  was  learned  pretty  soon  that  no  Church 
in  the  land  is  more  free  from  any  real  taint  of  partisan 
politics  than  the  Methodist  Episcopal.  From  clergy- 
men and  laymen  all  over  the  land  came  an  emphatic 
denial  of  the  right  of  any  body  to  engage  by  his  own 
conduct  the  political  action  of  any  member  in  any  polit- 
ical emergency  in  the  interest  of  any  party  or  candidate. 
Ministers,  presiding  elders,  editors  of  Methodist  papers, 
and  laymen,  including  even  Congressman  Springer,  on  the 
floor  of  Congreiks,  declared  with  one  voice  that  no  Bishop 
could  bind  their  free  poHtical  action.  Despite  these 
protestations  from  the  best-informed  parties,  and  in  the 
very  issue  whic  i  contained  them,  the  Herald  "  sought 
to  stimulate  the  excitement  by  announcing  in  startling 
head-lines,  ''The  True  Story;"  "The  Bishop's  Presiden- 
tial Support  Promised  Long  Ago;"  ''Six  Hundred 
Preachers  Indorsed  and  Sustained  It;  "  "Is  the  Method- 
ist Church  Committed  to  the  Renomination  of  Grant  ?  " 

Meanwhile  there  was  a  strong  sentiment  of  indigna- 
tion in  many  quarters  over  these  rash  and  unwar- 
ranted proceed  ngs  of  Bishop  Haven,  as  they  were  re- 
ported and  distorted  in  the  newspapers.    Cautious  and 


438  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

conservative  men  who  had  long  been  famihar  with  a 
certain  incalculable  and  volcanic  quality  of  his  speech 
and  conduct,  shook  their  heads  and  said,  "  There  goes 
our  sky-rockety  Bishop  again."  And  friendly  critics 
wondered  how  this  untamable  fire-brand  was  ever 
flung  into  such  conspicuous  and  perilous  position  as 
the  episcopal  chair.  Cooler  heads  observed  to  the  dis- 
turbed people  around  them  that  no  authentic  and  cred- 
ible report  of  the  meeting  had  yet  got  abroad ;  that  the 
brethren  who  were  present  had  not  confirmed  the  re- 
ports ;  that  the  accounts  were  so  grossly  and  ridicu- 
lously exaggerated  that  no  credence  should  be  given 
them  ;  and  that,  above  all,  Bishop  Haven  had  not  yet 
been  heard  from  on  these  wild  charges.  It  was  only 
by  urgent  and  ardent  effort  that  some  ministers'  meet- 
ings were  kept  from  denouncing  the  over-bold  Bishop 
for  meddling  with  matters  which  were  too  high  for  him. 

Presently  the  real  facts  came  to  light  from  all  quar- 
ters, and  great  was  the  relief  in  many  circles  to  learn 
that  the  whole  vast  tumult  had  been  blown  forth  all  over 
the  country  on  the  strength  of  a  single  light  breath  of 
episcopal  exhortation  :  Brethren,  pray  for  the  renomi- 
nation  of  General  Grant."  The  spirit  and  tact  with 
which  Dr.  Curry,  in  the  Advocate,"  and  Dr.  Edwards, 
in  the  North-western,"  defended  him  were  always 
gratefully  remembered  by  the  good  Bishop. 

To  understand  Bishop  Haven's  feeling  about  the 
South  one  must  remember  that  he  was  not  slow  to 
scent  danger.  He  showed  what  stuff  he  was  made  of 
in  his  war  Journal  in  these  words  : 


Bishop  Haven. 


439 


The  night  I  arrived,  as  I  was  turning  in,  there  was  a  sudden  cry 
and  a  rapid  firing  of  musketry.  I  drew  my  revolver,  conscious  that 
it  was  but  a  straw  in  my  hands  against  a  real  attack,  and  expecting 
to  be  soon  overwhelmed  by  the  enemy.  It  turned  out  to  be  senti- 
nels giving  an  alarm.  For  those  few  seconds  I  thought  my  life 
about  ended.  I  felt  a  tremor  such  as  I  expected  to  feel  as  a  well 
man  face  to  face  with  the  destroyer ;  but  I  also  felt  calm  and  sus- 
tained.   The  grace  of  Christ  sustained  me. 

After  having  known  as  brave  men  as  the  world  ever 
saw,  one  may  be  permitted  to  doubt  whether  a  braver 
than  Gilbert  Haven  ever  lived.  Some  are  born  brave, 
and  some  achieve  bravery.  His  bravery  was  not  the 
result  of  perfect  physical  health,  strong  and  unfaltering 
nerves,  and  complete  mastery  of  all  his  forces.  To  be 
sure,  he  had  these  in  so  great  a  degree  that  the  surgeon 
who  examined  him,  before  he  was  appointed  chaplain, 
declared  him  the  healthiest  man  he  had  handled.  But 
Mr.  Haven  had  one  of  those  active  imaginations  which 
see  all  the  magnitude  of  any  risk  or  task  they  confront. 
A  duller  mind  would  have  made  his  physical  equipment 
for  facing  perils  and  death  much  greater.  He  had  to 
suppress  the  sallies  of  his  imagination  before  he  could 
be  entirely  master  of  himself  when  he  first  came  under 
fire.  He  must  have  passed  through  many  a  scene  in  his 
various  career  where  his  own  words  told  his  feelings :  I 
thought  my  life  about  ended.  I  felt  a  tremor."  But 
when  that  flutter  had  spent  itself  he  came  to  the  sec- 
ond and  permanent  condition  of  sentiment  :  "  I  also  felt 
calm  and  sustained.  The  grace  of  Christ  sustained 
me."    When  Bishop  Ames  appointed  him  a  missionary 


440 


Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 


at  Vicksburg,  General  Banks  and  ^Nlr.  Redpath  and 
Judge  Russell  told  him  that  he  would  never  come  back 
alive  ;  but  he  would  have  gone  at  once  if  Ames  had  not 
made  it  impossible  for  him  to  engage  in  that  work  with- 
out doing  violence  to  principles  dearer  than  life.  He 
opened  all  his  perplexities  and  troubles  to  the  writer  at 
that  crisis  hour,  and  the  intensity  of  his  vision  of  the 
dangers  of  his  perilous  field  was  only  matched  by  the 
cool  resolution  with  which  he  turned  to  meet  them. 
The  private  Journal  shows  how  vivid  was  his  percep- 
tion of  the  perils  that  infested  the  South  all  the  while 
he  resided  in  Atlanta.  About  the  time  he  asked  the 
Boston  Preachers'  Meeting  to  pray  for  the  renomination 
of  Grant  he  made  this  entry  : 

The  South  is  full  of  murder.  New  Orleans  rebels  have  risen  and 
driven  out  the  Republican  government.  Grant  issued  his  proclama- 
tion ordering  them  to  disperse  in  five  days.  There  is  a  big  war 
afoot  there.  It  is  not  very  safe  to  go  back.  How  slow  the  steps  of 
liberty  !  .  .  .  For  the  first  time  I  have  felt  death  near." 

A  little  later  this  occurs: 

Saturday  I  arrived  at  Atlanta.  Mr.  Spalding  had  informed  me 
that  he  did  not  wish  to  board  me  longer.  Social  reasons  controlled 
him.  He  had  also  sent  away  Rev.  Mr.  Otheman,  because  he  had 
defended  the  civil  rights  of  men  of  color,  and  his  boarders  said  they 
would  not  stand  it.  I  came  to  the  Kimball  House,  and  here  I  am 
yet.  Things  are  very  much  darker  here  than  before  I  left.  The 
elections  have  gone  heavily  Democratic.  At  the  polls  here  Mr. 
Sherman  told  me  negroes  were  kept  from  voting.  The  United 
States  Marshal  went  to  Savannah  and  put  a  traitor  in  his  place. 
He  swore  in  wicked  fellows  and  refused  to  swear  in  a  Republican, 
Mr.  Clark.    Mr.  Sherman  rode  up  and  saw  that  the  colored  men 


Bishop  HavExN. 


441 


could  not  vote.  The  crowd  prevented  their  coming  to  the  polls, 
they  were  packed  sd  close.  He  told  them  to  follow  him.  He  sat  on 
horseback  and  tock  the  names  of  sixty-seven  who  could  not  vote. 
He  called  on  the  Chief  of  Police  to  assist  him.  The  latter  rode  up 
and  Mr.  Sherman  placed  his  own  horse  beside  his  still  taking  names. 
The  mob  followed  him  round  the  square,  inside  the  fences,  headed 
by  Major  Spencer,  Two  policemen  insulted  him  to  get  him  to 
strike  back,  but  as  he  kept  near  the  blue-coats  people  jeered  and 
mocked  and  said,  "  Sherman  is  keeping  a  poll  of  his  own.  He's  no 
gentleman,  he's  a  rJgger  lover."    It  was  plucky. 

And  yet  later  : 

Saw  Congress  adjourn.  It  has  been  very  cowardly.  But  it  gives 
us  the  Civil  Rights  Bill  in  part.  Lunched  with  General  Butler.  He 
thinks  war  will  come.  Says  he  will  lead  the  colored  troops  if  it  does 
break  out. 

I  wrote  an  article  in  the  '*  Independent,"  headed  "  Ding  Dong,"  a 
ringing  note  for  amalgamation.  The  papers  strike  it.  It  wakes  up 
terrific  echoes.  The  North  is  as  bad  as  the  South.  This  shows 
where  the  sore  is.  God  will  ring  that  bell  until  he  rings  out  this 
crime  of  caste.  The  South  hates  me  so  that  under  protection  of  this 
cry  they  may  take  my  life.  Be  it  so.  Perhaps  my  hour  has  come. 
The  truth  will  win  whether  I  live  or  die. 

Then  follows  this : 

I  have  testified  ;o  a  wicked  people.  God  may  yet  require  me  to 
testify  unto  blood.  God  help  me  if  such  is  his  will !  This  most  cruel- 
hearted  hate  of  brothers  and  sisters  touched  with  color  must  disap- 
pear, though  it  wi  1  not  go  without  blood.  They  lie  in  wait  for  my 
words.  Only  night  before  last  I  saw  Brother  Wilson,  of  Baltimore, 
at  the  depot  and  talked  with  him  a  few  minutes.  Next  morning  out 
came  a  statement  of  my  conversation,  not  true,  in  the  "  Constitu- 
tion," caught  in  part  and  manufactured  mostly  by  some  eavesdrop- 
per. How  quick  they  would  kill  me  if  they  dared.  But  they  fear 
19* 


442  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

that  will  elect  Grant.  Yet  I  do  not  feel  perfectly  safe.  Even  as  I 
write  I  listen  for  sounds  of  foes  without. 

"  Jesus  protects  ;  my  fears,  begone  !" 
How  the  colored  people  crowd  to  me.    Such  love  and  confidence  I 
never  expected  to  see.    God  bless  them,  and  all  their  enemies  ! 

Southern  papers  published  a  multitude  of  articles 
criticising  him  in  his  work  and  its  methods.  When 
these  were  candid  and  courteous  in  their  temper  he 
never  thought  of  complaining.  He  was  glad  of  free 
discussions  between  all  honest  men  whose  duty  or  in- 
clination led  them  to  examine  public  questions  with 
the  aim  of  molding  public  opinion.  He  knew  that  such 
debates  are  great  disseminators  of  truth  in  the  minds 
that  are  most  reluctant  to  behold  it.  But  other  South- 
ern journals  published  columns  of  coarse  and  vulgar 
misinterpretation.  The  ignorant,  vicious,  lawless,  and 
rebel  element  of  the  South  was  what  he  feared.  He 
knew  what  it  was  capable  of,  for  among  the  victims 
of  its  rage  were  many  of  the  colored  people  whose 
guest  he  had  been.  Preachers  whom  he  appointed  to 
perilous  places  had  in  some  cases  been  raided  by  the 
Ku  Klux.  Ministers  had  been  murdered  solely  because 
they  would  preach  the  Gospel  of  Christ  to  men  of  color. 

What  he  feared  was  that  the  bitter  hostility  of  Southern 
fanatics  and  the  half-way  approval  given  by  better  peo- 
ple to  such  outrages  might  nerve  some  crank  to  send  a 
murderous  bullet  through  his  brain.  This  apprehen- 
sion was  so  vivid  and  constant  that  he  one  day  told  the 
whole  story  with  the  remark,  I  have  never  heard  a 
pistol  shot  in  the  South  zvithout  ivondering  that  I  was 


Bishop  Haven.  443 

alive  to  hear  itT  But  that  constant  apprehension  never 
kept  him  from  a  place,  a  deed,  or  an  utterance  called  for 
in  the  line  of  public  and  official  duties.  He  had  the 
spirit  if  not  the  honor  of  martyrdom. 

He  was  no  blind  worshiper  of  General  Grant.  He 
thought  his  first  nomination  for  the  Presidency  a  mis- 
take, mainly  because  he  feared  that  he  would  not  put 
heart  enough  into  his  defense  of  the  freedmen.  It  was 
not  until  he  saw  that  the  modest  soldier  brought  a  reso- 
lute will  to  this  thankless  task  that  he  began  to  feel  any 
thing  like  a  personal  enthusiasm  for  the  taciturn  hero. 
Before  he  had  ever  seen  the  President  he  had  warmly 
defended  his  course  in  these  matters.  After  he  had 
pointed  out  such  facts  to  Mr.  Sumner,  Mr.  Haven  saw 
President  Grant  at  different  times,  conversed  with  him 
about  the  state  of  the  South,  answered  his  questions, 
told  him  of  the  religious  and  educational  work  going  on 
there,  and  even  got  subscriptions  from  him  for  some  of 
it.  He  grew  to  think  that  all  the  nascent  growths  of 
religion,  education,  civilization,  and  patriotism  there, 
were  safest  in  his  hands. 

In  an  unfinished  letter,  probably  intended  for  the 
"  Independent,"  he  says  : 

A  third  term  for  President  Grant  is  the  only  hope  for  the  future 
safety  and  prosperity  of  the  South.  A  civiHan  in  the  Presidential 
chair  cannot  hold  this  people  in  check.  I  know  what  I  say  and  say 
what  I  know.  Men  may  say  and  think  what  they  will  to  the  con- 
trary, but  I  knov.'  this  people  as  well  as  any  man  living,  and  am  bold 
to  say  that  "  the  man  on  horseback "  is  the  only  instrumentality 
that  can  control  the  mad  and  blinded  disunion  element  of  this  coun- 


444 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


try,  and  bring  order  and  beauty  out  of  confusion.  The  old  leaven 
of  hate  and  treason  is  still  here.  Such  men  as  Toombs  and  R.  C.  Hill 
are  doing  all  they  can  to  fan  the  passions  of  the  people  to  greater 
destructiveness. 

I  have  no  idea  that  President  Grant  has  ever  for  a  moment  contem- 
plated a  third  term.  But  the  quiet,  thoughtful,  union-loving  people  Of 
the  countr}'  have,  and  an  unanswerable  necessity  will  force  on  him  the 
laborious  cares  and  duties  of  another  term.  This  fact  dashes  all 
contrary  argument  into  atoms,  and  gives  them  to  the  wind  as 
utterly  worthless.  The  blood  of  the  Unionists  was  spilled  to  cement 
the  Nation  for  all  times  to  come,  and,  I  repeat,  President  Grant  is 
the  only  man  who  can  complete  the  work  of  reconstruction  and 
give  us  a  perfect  union  and  perfect  peace. 

In  judging  these  views  of  Bishop  Haven,  we  should 
bear  in  mind  that  the  condition  of  the  colored  people 
in  the  South  was  a  source  of  keen  and  wearing  anxiety 
to  his  mind.  He  had  learned  the  whole  story  of  their 
wrongs  and  oppressions  from  the  very  lips  of  men  who 
had  been  smitten  by  the  blind  fury  of  the  defeated 
rebel.  Others  might  be  mistaken  or  deluded  in  regard 
to  the  condition  of  that  country,  but  he  could  not,  and 
he  was  stirred  to  the  depths  of  his  being  when  public 
opinion  was  led  astray  on  these  topics.  We  give  some 
experiences  of  his  own  on  this  subject : 

At  Jackson,  Miss.,  I  had  a  new  sensation.  Going  into  the  hall 
of  the  Edwards  House,  Mr.  Johnson,  a  presiding  elder,  introduced 
me  to  the  clerk  by  my  title.  I  asked  the  clerk  if  my  friend,  Rev.  Mr. 
Scott,  could  breakfast  with  me.  The  clerk  said  he  would  ask  the 
proprietor,  and  soon  returned  and  said  they  would  be  happy  to 
serve  us.  So  they  showed  us  to  our  room,  and  when  we  returned 
the  clerk  took  us  into  the  dining-room,  carried  us  to  the  upper  end 
and  placed  us  at  the  side-board,  the  front  of  which  had  a  white  cloth 


Bishop  Haven. 


445 


and  three  plates,  the  back  being  occupied  with  castors,  pitchers,  and 
such  ware.    We  sat  down,  looked  at  each  other,  and  Mr.  Scott  said, 

"  Do  you  understand  this  }  " 

"  I  think  I  do.    I  shall  not  stay  here." 

The  clerk  stood  at  the  second  table  looking  at  us,  as  did  two  or 
three  gentlemen  who  had  come  on  the  train  with  us.  We  rose  and 
went  back  to  the  first  table.    I  said, 

"We'll  take  our  breakfast  here." 

"You  can't  do  so,"  said  the  clerk.    "  We  claim  the  right  to  place 
our  guests  where  we  please." 
-"  You  can't  place  us  there  ;  we  shall  sit  here." 
"You  can't  be  served  here." 
"  Where  is  the  proprietor  ?  " 
"  In  the  office." 
"  Go  and  call  him." 
"  You  can  go  and  see  him." 

I  went  out  and  met  him  in  the  hall,  and  asked  about  our  breakfast. 
"Breakfast  has  been  waiting  for  you  some  time." 
"Yes,  but  we  wish  to  sit  at  the  regular  table." 
"What's  the  matter?  what's,  what's" — all  in  a  fluster. 
I  told  him.    He  came  in  and  said, 

"  Serve  these  gentlemen  where  they  please,"  and  the  scene  ended. 
It  is  said  that  no  colored  man  had  ever  dined  there  before. 

I  wrote  Mr.  Sumner  a  note  only  a  week  or  two  before  he  died  on 
the  Civil  Rights  Bill.  I  hope  it  will  pass.  The  feeling  here  is  exceed- 
ingly bitter  toward  it,  never  so  bitter  toward  any  other  bill.  How 
detestable  is  this  feeling !  I  am  often  in  jeopardy  by  my  conduct 
toward  it.  Last  week,  Monday,  I  went  into  the  colored  car  from 
Augusta  to  Waynesborough,  and  was  driven  out  by  the  conductor. 
I  declined  to  go,  but  he  ordered  me  out.  I  did  not  quite  refuse,  but 
sought  to  postpone  it.  He  would  have  put  me  out  if  I  had  not  gone. 
I  asked  him  if  he  did  not  have  trouble  in  the  matter. 

"  Not  often.    Seldom  do  we  see  any  body  so  particular  as  you." 

I  vowed  to  the  Lord  that  I  would  not  rest  till  that  brother  could 
come  and  ride  by  me. 


44^  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

Blaine  and  Morton  have  made  thrilling  speeches  on  the  right  side. 
/  Every  body  is  scared.  The  South  is  ugly  and  venomous.  In  Mis- 
sissippi we  were  in  constant  jeopardy.  We  dared  not  leave  our 
windows  up.  The  whites  were  very  mad  at  my  being  there.  I  was 
able  to  say  some  things  which  they  will  remember.  The  blacks  are 
terribly  oppressed.  They  are  in  peril  every  hour.  I  have  felt  quite 
sure  I  should  not  pass  through  this  trip  unharmed.  I  am  not  with- 
out fears  yet. 

We  see  from  these  statements,  all  written  before  the 
scene  at  the  Boston  Preachers'  Meeting,  that  this  much 
heralded  and  criticised  deed  of  Bishop  Haven  sprang 
out  of  the  deepest  emotions  and  convictions  of  his  mind 
in  regard  to  the  duty  owed  by  the  Nation  to  the  negro. 

It  was  the  act  of  a  chief  pastor  of  the  flock  of  Christ 
and  not  the  theatrical  exploit  of  an  adroit  politician. 
The  only  thing  about  which  he  was  anxious  during  the 
weeks  when  his  name  was  tossed  about  the  Nation  as 
few  names  ever  have  been,  was  to  avoid  any  seeming 
interference  in  partisan  politics.  The  papers  having 
been  foolish  enough  to  speak  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church  as  a  political  body.  Bishop  Haven  told  some 
interviewer  that  his  second  choice  for  the  presidency 
was  General  Sherman,  a  Catholic  by  affiliation. 

It  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  nearly  all  Mr.  Haven's 
interest  in  politics  during  his  later  years  turned  around 
this  pivot.  He  distrusted  the  Hayes  administration,  in 
spite  of  its  high  merits,  almost  solely  because  he  sup- 
posed it  timid  and  half-hearted  in  its  handling  of  all 
Southern  questions.  He  was  bitterly  assailed  in  the 
Northern  press  for  the  steadiness  wherewith  he  denied 
the  rose-colored  notions  concerning  the  state  of  the 


Bishop  Haven.  447 

South  which  it  was,  for  a  while,  the  fashion  to  main- 
tain. 

Events  soon  put  an  end  to  this  heedless  and  unwise 
way  of  talking  about  such  matters,  and  showed  that  the 
Bishop  had  the  surest  eye  for  all  phases  of  Southern 
life,  which  was  then  spying  out  the  land.  The  most 
interesting  part  of  his  relation  to  these  questions  showed 
itself  in  his  funeral  discourse  on  the  first  anniversary  of 
the  murder  of  Judge  Chisholm,  his  son,  and  daughter,  in 
Kemper  County,  Miss.,  delivered  at  the  Metropolitan 
Church,  in  Washington,  May  19,  1878.  Bishop  Haven 
had  only  been  able  to  give  a  few  broken  hours  between 
the  sessions  of  the  Episcopal  Board  to  his  preparation 
for  speaking.  He  arrived  in  Washington  late  Saturday 
evening,  went  to  the  hospitable  house  of  his  friend 
Judge  Tullock,  and  withdrew  into  the  library  to  resume 
and  complete  his  funeral  oration.  His  health  was  not 
firm,  and  both  while  writing  it  late  into  the  weary  night 
and  the  next  day  while  reading  it  in  a  low,  intense,  sub- 
dued manner,  not  daring  to  give  vent  to  the  firey  tide 
that  glowed  within  for  fear  of  the  inevitable  nervous 
prostration,  he  felt  the  slow,  cold,  and  deadly  creep,  creep, 
creep  of  the  African  malaria  in  all  his  veins.  As  he  went 
on  speaking  he  felt  a  sensation  as  of  an  icy  wind  blowing 
through  his  flesh  and  bones,  and  he  sat  down  at  the  close 
dreading  a  sudden  relapse  into  most  perilous  chills  and 
fever. 

Mary  Clemmer,  in  the  "  Independent,"  told  the  story 
of  that  service  as  a  spectator  saw  it.  We  select  from 
her  recital  : 


448 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


On  one  of  the  fairest  of  May  mornings,  a  jewel  of  sunshine  and 
azure  set  between  days  of  shadow  and  storm,  the  concourse  that 
entered  the  Metropolitan  Church  was  noticeable,  even  in  this  church- 
going  city.  It  was  announced  in  its  pulpit  the  Sunday  before,  that 
the  morning  of  this  day  would  be  set  apart  for  memorial  services  in 
memory  of  Cornelia  Chisholm.  her  father  and  brother. 

This  announcement  brought  together  a  remarkable  congregation. 
First,  the  usual  congregation  of  the  Metropolitan  Church,  which 
is  a  large  and  intelligent  one.  .  .  .  Amid  this  goodly  company  I 
counted  the  rarely  good  face  of  George  W.  M'Crary,  the  Secretary 
of  War ;  of  Senator  and  Mrs.  Rollins,  of  New  Hampshire  ;  of  Sena- 
tor and  Mrs.  Windom,  of  Minnesota;  of  Mrs.  John  P.  Hale,  of  New 
Hampshire  ;  and  of  many  another  less  known  to  the  world.  In  addition 
to  these  were  men  and  women  widely  known  for  their  public  opposition 
to  the  administration  of  Hayes.  In  a  seat  near  the  front  sat  Mrs. 
Chisholm,  between  her  two  fatherless  boys.  She  was  dressed  in 
deepest  mourning,  and  beside  her  sat  a  woman,  wearing  the  same 
attire,  whose  unutterably  sad  yet  sweet  face  no  one  who  looked  upon 
it  could  fail  to  observe.  She  was  Mrs.  Gilmer,  less  widely  known 
yet  scarcely  less  a  victim  to  Southern  barbarism  than  Mrs.  Chisholm. 
Her  husband,  whose  only  crime  seemed  to  be  his  adhesion  to  Judge 
Chisholm  while  in  prison,  was  shot  dead  by  the  ruffians  of  Kemper. 

To  such  an  audience  Bishop  Haven  spoke  in  condem- 
nation of 

MURDER  FOR  OPINION'S  SAKE. 

It  is  an  instinct  of  man  that  funeral  rites  should  accompany  his 
body  to  its  long  home.  The  ancient  heathen  could  not  cross  the 
Styx  and  reach  the  Elysian  fields  if  his  body  lacked  the  proper  cere- 
monies of  sepulture.  However  hasty  the  flight  of  the  living,  he  must 
still  pause  long  enough  to  throw  three  handfuls  of  dust  upon  the 
corpse  of  his  comrade,  and  pronounce  a  solemn  hail  and  farewell. 
Otherwise  that  companion  must  wander  a  hundred  years  on  the 
shaded  side  of  the  land  of  shades  ere  he  finds  repose  and  bliss. 


Bishop  Haven. 


449 


What  is  instinct  is  also  religion.  Christianity  lays  a  like  necessity 
on  its  devotees  and  the  peoples  to  whom  it  is  the  only  religion,  even 
when  they  are  not  its  devotees.  One  shrinks  less  from  the  crema- 
tion fires  than  from  the  faithless,  hopeless,  and  riteless  circumstances 
that  attend  that  act.  No  prayer,  no  word  of  sympathy,  no  hymn  of 
consolation,  no  hint  of  reunion  accompany  the  dread  burning.  The 
ancient  employers  of  this  mode  of  burial  were  less  irreverent.  To 
the  height  of  their  religious  knowledge  they  performed  this  sad 
service. 

In  accordance  with  this  race-honored  custom,  we  come  together 
to-day  to  engage  in  the  solemn  duties  demanded  by  the  dead,  no 
less  than  by  the  living.  We  come  to  bury,  not  to  praise.  We  come 
to  satisfy  the  just  longings  of  a  widowed  and  child-reft  heart,  of  a 
fatherless  and  sisterless  family,  that  their  dead  may  be  decently 
buried.  We  come  to  scatter  flowers  from  full  hands  on  "  a  rare  and 
radiant  maiden,"  on  a  brave  and  true  man,  on  a  sweet  and  loving 
lad.  We  come  to  bury  the  dead  out  of  our  sight  by  those  ceremo- 
nies known  and  felt  in  all  ages  and  lands  as  befitting  these  sad 
necessities  of  humanity.  If  the  occasion  leads  further  in*  its  sug- 
gestions, these  suggestions  do  not  create  the  occasion.  A  stricken 
family  craves  a  funeral  service.  Shall  it  be  refused  .-^  They  have 
waited  a  year  and  a  day  for  such  services.  Shall  they  continue  to 
wait  ?  Shall  the  wife  and  mother  mourn  with  bitterer  mourning  be- 
cause no  voice  of  prayer,  no  song  of  comfort,  no  word  of  Christian 
consolation  have  been  uttered  over  her  lost  ones  ?  Who  of  us  can 
begrudge  this  little  gift  ?  Who  of  us  shall  say  that  such  consecra- 
tion is  a  desecration?  Who  shall  complain  that  the  Lord's  day  and 
the  Lord's  house  are  employed  in  this  most  Christian  service? 

Let  us  with  bowed  hearts  dwell  under  the  shadow  of  this  still 
present  calamity.  Let  us  stand  round  this  mourning  Rizpah,  who 
lies  prostrate  before  her  dead,  not  sons  alone,  but  husband  and 
daughter  and  son — that  perfect  trinity  to  woman's  heart — who  has 
lain  there,  lo,  these  many  months  ;  who  refuses  to  be  comforted, 
not  only  because  they  are  not,  but  also  because,  in  every  fiber  of  her 
soul,  they  are  still  unburied.    Let  us  gather  about  these  lads,  who 


450 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


stand  in  manly  silence  before  the  graves  of  their  household,  the 
revered  father,  the  oldest  brother,  heir  thereby  in  their  conscious- 
ness to  the  headship  of  their  own  family  and  generation,  and  their 
adored  sister,  and  who  solemnly  await  the  due  rites  of  the  Church 
over  their  beloved  dead.  May  Rizpah  now  tind  comfort,  and  the 
household  accept  these  tributes  as  a  proper  burial !  I  shall  not 
dwell  upon  the  scene  that  rises  before  your  eyes  in  all  its  horror.  I 
dare  not.  My  own  feelings  cannot  bear  the  sight.  A  year  ago,  the 
29th  of  last  month,  no  happier  family  blossomed  in  all  this  land— in 
any  land.  .  .  . 

Into  that  scene  of  loveliness  in  home  and  nature  the  destroyer 
came.  On  the  1 5th  of  the  next  month,  a  year  ago  last  Wednesday,  the 
grave  had  closed  over  three  of  that  household,  gone  down  in  bloody 
winding  clothes,  unwept,  unhonored,  and  unsung.  No  prayer,  no 
sermon,  no  word  of  Christian  strength  and  sympathy  was  uttered  at 
the  darkened  home,  or  at  the  grave's  mouth.  The  stroke  of  fate 
was  never  swifter  or  sharper.  "  So  swift  treads  sorrow  on  the 
heels  of  joy  !  "  Had  this  violence  happened  at  the  hands  of  the  red 
man,  how  the  whole  land  would  have  rung  with  indignation,  how 
fast  would  have  flowed  the  tears  of  neighbors  and  of  the  Nation, 
how  intense  the  throb  of  sympathy,  how  earnest  the  prayers,  how 
hot  the  righteous  anger !  But  it  was  thou,  my  equal,  my  guide, 
my  acquaintance.  We  took  sweet  counsel  together,  and  walked 
unto  the  house  of  God  in  company.  It  was  those  that  had  eaten 
bread  from  his  hands  that  smote  him  unto  the  death— nay,  it  was 
the  great,  great  Wrong  behind,  above,  below,  through  these  which 
bore  them  on  too  willingly  to  the  deed.  To-day  the  only  reparation 
meet  is  a  public  funeral  where  they  fell,  a  public  confession  from 
those  by  whom  they  fell,  a  public  monument  testifying  to  their  sor- 
row at  the  event  that  has  made  their  county  fearfully  famous  in  all 
the  world.  Such  lamentation  and  dedication  will  yet  be  made.  If 
they  or  their  children  fail  to  do  this  holy  duty,  others  will  certainly 
do  the  same.    It  is  the  eternal  law. 

A  week  ago  I  rode  by  a  granite  statue,  exquisitely  carved,  of  a 
brave  and  beautiful  woman.    It  was  erected  only  a  year  or  two  since. 


Bishop  Haven. 


451 


and  is  in  honor  of  Hannah  Dustin,  who,  in  1698,  nearly  two  hun- 
dred years  ago,  there  showed  extraordinary  valor  in  rescuing  her- 
self and  children  from  savage  captors.  The  land  has  never  let  the 
memory  of  her  courage  die,  and  has  at  last  molded  it  into  enduring 
shape.  None  the  less  will  the  same  land  remember  the  not  inferior 
courage  and  faithfulness  of  Cornelia  Josephine  Chisholm.  Nay,  it 
will  the  more  remember,  for  this  woman  died  for  her  love  and  devo- 
tion. She  chose  to  die.  Her  "  sweet  papa  "  was  in  jeopardy — nay, 
was  in  the  grip  of  death.  Rather  than  fly  from  his  side  she  hast- 
ened unto  it.  She  prepared  for  the  defense  of  his  life  with  ammuni- 
tion concealed  about  her  person.  She  interposed  to  save  him  after 
her  own  face  had  been  filled  with  wounds  from  shot  that  cleft  the 
iron  from  the  bars,  and  her  arm  had  been  shattered  from  wrist  to 
shoulder  as  she  covered  his  heart  with  its  protecting  embrace.  She 
begged  them  to  take  her  life  and  spare  her  "  darling  papa."  But  all 
in  vain.  Theirs  was  the  long  intimacy  of  the  oldest  child  and  only 
daughter  with  the  father,  an  intimacy  the  deepest  that  family  ties 
can  know,  unless  it  be  the  corresponding  affection  of  the  oldest  child 
and  only  son  with  his  mother,  and  this  intimacy  is  less  delicate  and 
tender  in  its  filial  phases.  They  had  made  this  depth  of  mutual 
devotion  deeper  and  dearer  by  their  winter  in  Washington,  and  in 
Northern  travel.  They  had  clung  together  these  many  months  of 
home  separation,  only  now  to  show  how  they  could  die  together. 

Brave  and  manly  as  were  the  father  and  son  in  that  awful  hour, 
they  were  exceeded  in  coolness  of  daring,  in  intensity  of  purpose,  in 
completeness  of  self-possession,  in  readiness  of  resource,  in  earnest- 
ness of  petition,  in  every  element  of  highest  humanhood  by  this  frail 
girl  of  nineteen.  Cornelia  is  a  name  that  ranks  high  in  Roman  an- 
nals. Her  boast  of  her  sons  as  her  jewels  has  shone  her  brightest 
jewel  for  more  than  twenty  centuries.  But  this  Cornelia  excelled 
the  earliest  of  her  name.  Her  jewel  was  her  passionate  devotion  to 
her  father  in  this  hour  of  death.  That  shall  shine  forever.  No 
waste  of  time  can  dim  its  brightness.  Immortality  will  but  increase 
its  beauty  and  its  worth.  Josephine  is  a  historic  name.  A  proud 
and  capable  woman  stands  at  the  front  of  this  century  mastering 


452 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


the  master  of  the  world.  Divorced  and  degraded,  she  rules  him 
from  her  enforced  seclusion.  Those  of  her  blood  still  sit  on 
thrones,  and  are  heirs  to  imperial  crowns.  But  this  Josephine 
would  be  g-ladly  welcomed  by  that  illustrious  lady  as  her  peer  in 
every  quality  of  womanhood  and  manhood,  for  the  highest  traits  of 
humanity  met  and  mingled  in  one  brief  hour. 

But  that  morning  she  was  a  simple  girl,  "  heart-whole  "  as  she 
wrote  loving,  girlish  things.  In  that  hour  she  towered  an  angel, 
princely  and  potent,  glowing  in  the  fires  of  death  with  the  strength 
and  glory  of  Beatrice  in  the  upper  circles  of  the  heavens.  Welcome 
to  the  undying  names  of  mankind  be  that  of  this  worthy  successor 
of  the  great  Cornelia  and  Josephine. 

We  shall  not  enter  upon  the  field  that  lies  before  your  every 
thought.  Why  was  this  deed  done,  and  what  shall  be  the  end  of 
these  things  if  allowed  to  go  unrebuked  of  the  nations,  ye  need  not 
that  I  should  teach  you.  Your  hearts  are  inditing  no  pleasant, 
though,  perhaps,  it  may  prove  a  profitable  matter.  The  sodden 
lamb,  the  unleavened  cake,  and  the  bitter  herbs  made  a  useful  meal 
to  the  thoughtful  Israelite.  He  reflected  on  the  hour  when  death 
reigned  in  every  Egyptian  household,  and  his  own,  by  miracle, 
escaped.  So  we  may  sup  on  lenten  food  this  hour,  and  find  it  nutri- 
tious to  soul  and  spirit.  The  angel  of  death,  not  God-sent,  but 
devil-driven,  hovers  over  much  of  our  land,  smiting  with  blood- 
strokes  the  victims  of  his  cruel  wrath.  He  has  left  your  homes  free, 
yet  only  for  a  season.  If  we  allow  murder  for  opinion's  sake  to  be 
the  law  of  one  part  of  our  land,  it  will  soon  be  of  all  parts.  Can  one 
member  suffer  and  all  not  suffer  with  it  ?  Can  a  leading  citizen  and 
his  family  be  set  on  and  slain  in  Massachusetts  for  political  causes, 
and  peace  and  safety  attend  the  ballot  in  Mississippi  ?  No  more 
can  the  reverse  be  true.  The  present  honeycombing  of  Pennsylva- 
nia with  murder,  which  stern  and  unrelenting  justice  cannot  abate  ; 
the  communistic  threatenings  in  Chicago  and  California  ;  the  bloody 
strikes  along  the  Ohio  ;  the  tramp  wandering  murderously  over  one 
half  of  our  Union,  is  the  natural,  the  inevitable  outcome  of  the  un- 
willingness of  the  national  Government  to  protect  its  citizens  in  the 


Bishop  Haven. 


453 


other  half.  The  theory-  that  State  Governments  have  such  absolute 
control  of  life  and  death  within  their  territories,  that  the  nation  can- 
not cross  their  boundaries  to  protect  its  citizens  and  punish  their 
murderers,  has  brought  us  to  this  weak  and  miserable  pass.  We 
are  affrighted  at  the  shadow  glowering  at  our  own  hearthstone.  In  se- 
cluded Vermont,  in  crowded  Cincinnati,  in  remote  Maine,  in  Central 
Indiana  the  same  terror  besets  us  by  night,  the  same  deadly  danger 
by  day. 

One  Indian  massacre  arouses  every  part  of  the  land  ;  be  it  the 
Modocs  of  Oregon,  or  the  Sioux  of  Minnesota,  or  the  Utes  of  Colo- 
rado, or  the  Comanches  of  Arizona,  indignation  and  wrath  leaps 
from  end  to  end  of  the  continent,  and  that,  too,  when  no  one  dreams 
that  the  dread  foe  is  to  steal  into  Eastern  homes  and  renew  his  hor- 
rors at  Wyoming  or  Schenectady.  But  this  deed  has  universal  na- 
tional application.  It  proves  universal  national  weakness  ;  it  breeds 
universal  national  disaster.  A  people  that  cannot  protect  itself  is 
no  people.  It  falls  to  pieces  when  it  allows  its  members  to  be  cut 
to  pieces. 

Said  a  gentleman  to  me  but  yesterday,  who  had  just  returned 
from  abroad,  "  The  old  world  is  over-governed  ;  we,  under-gov- 
erned. Nothing  strikes  me  more  forcibly  on  re-entering  this  land 
than  the  lack  of  national  power  over  its  own  citizens."  Unless  a 
stronger  government  arises,  we  shall  dissolve  and  disappear  as  a 
nation.  We  sigh  for  the  verification  of  the  seal  of  Massachusetts — 
an  uplifted  arm  holding  a  sword,  which  alone  gives  placid  quiet 
under  liberty.  We  have  taken  the  first  step  in  verifying  our  right  to 
exist  as  a  nation  on  gigantic  fields  of  strife  by  bloody  and  costly 
valor.  We  must  carry  forward  and  complete  this  work  in  the  na- 
tional protection  of  every  citizen  in  his  every  right.  We  must  de- 
fend freedom  of  speech  and  freedom  of  ballot,  or  we  perish  from  the 
earth. 

To  this  coming  perfection  of  national  peace  and  power  this  sad 
event  will  contribute.  This  family  group  are  martyrs  to  American 
equality  of  right,  to  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  and  to  the 
preamble  of  the  Constitution.    It  was  for  the  cause  of  equal  rights 


454 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


the  father  fought  and  the  family  fell.  It  was  for  the  protection  of 
every  citizen  at  the  polls  ;  for  true  Democracy — the  government  of 
the  majority  of  the  voters  legally  and  fearlessly  expressed  ;  for  the 
American  nation  ;  for  the  rights  of  mankind  ;  that  this  citizen  of 
America,  with  his  brave  son  and  braver  daughter,  laid  down  their 
lives. 

Their  cries  of  agony  and  death  shall  never  be  forgotten,  never 
below,  never  above. 

"  Their  moans 
The  vales  redouble  to  the  hills,  and  they 
To  heaven." 

Their  forms  will  be  wrought  into  marble,  painted  upon  canvass, 
honored  in  prose  and  verse,  held  in  high  and  higher  remembrance 
as  years  and  ages  go  by.  The  children  of  the  fathers  who  so  igno- 
rantly  slew  them  will  build  their  sumptuous  sepulchers.  That  lone 
and  dread  procession  that  thrice  threaded  the  dismal  path  a  score  of 
miles — a  feeble  few,  without  minister,  or  even  sexton,  to  assist  them, 
bearing  the  bloody  dead,  in  jeopardy  of  life  as  they  pursued  their 
mournful  journey — will  yet  be  changed  into  a  solemn,  penitential, 
but  glad  multitude  of  the  citizens  of  the  same  county,  with  their 
wives  and  daughters  and  sons,  gathering  about  that  green  spot, 
where  they  were  thus  buried,  to  make  confession  of  their  fathers' 
transgression  by  such  deeds  of  atonement  as  marble,  and  eulogy, 
and  prayer,  and  sermon  are  able  to  give.  May  those  remains,  now 
on  their  way  to  a  safer  resting-place,  be  recalled,  as  were  those  of 
Dante,  by  the  city  of  his  birth,  by  those  still  hostile  fellow-citizens  to 
the  place  of  their  birth,  and  death,  and  the  name  of  that  county,  so 
dishonored  now,  by  this  act  of  penitence,  be  restored  to  its  former 
esteem  ! 

To  the  future,  then,  poor  stricken  wife  and  mother,  poor  father- 
less and  sisterless  youth,  to  the  future  cast  your  wet  but  hopeful 
eyes,  wet  with  joyful  tears,  tears  for  the  dead  beloved,  joy  that  they 
died  so  gloriously,  and  won  in  one  short  hour  immortal  fame.  Had 
they  not  thus  died,  the  world  had  never  known  them.  Had  they  not 
thus  died,  liberty,  equality,  fraternity  for  our  land,  and  all  its  peoples. 


Bishop  Haven. 


455 


perhaps,  had  never  been  attained.  There  may  be  many  another 
bloody  step  ere  that  high  table-land  of  humanity  and  America  is 
reached. 

It  may  be  that  others,  who  now  speak  and  hear,  may  be  required, 
also,  to  make  for  their  nation  like  holy  sacrifice.  In  this  city,  where 
our  greatest  citizen  gave  his  life  for  the  life  of  the  land,  we  can 
properly  note  the  slow  and  bleeding  feet  of  the  martyrs  to  Christ 
and  our  country.  May  we,  if  called,  be  as  willing  and  ready  to  fol- 
low the  Christ,  and  these  his  disciples,  for  the  protection  of  the  work 
of  human  regeneration.  It  may  be  that  the  whole  nation  will  yet  be 
compelled  to  wrestle  in  the  sweat  of  this  great  agony  for  equal  rights 
of  all  men,  as  it  has  had  to  wrestle  for  independence  and  for  exist- 
ence. It  may  be  that  Enceladus  will  yet  arise  from  under  this 
mountain  of  permitted  prejudice  and  hate  in  a  manner  at  which  all 
the  world  shall  stand  aghast — a  Kemper  County  massacre  in  every 
hamlet  of  the  land.  It  may  be  that  we  shall  yet  be  compelled  to  cry 
out  in  bitterness  of  spirit : 

"Ah,  me!  for  the  land  that  is  sown 

With  the  harvest  of  despair  ! 
Where  the  burning  cinders,  blown 
From  the  lips  of  the  overthrown 

Enceladus,  fill  the  air  !  " 

God  forbid  that  such  a  horror  shall  light  upon  our  land !  God 
will  not  forbid  it  if  we  let  his  children's  blood  cry  to  him  from  the 
ground.  God  did  not  forbid,  could  not  forbid,  Cain's  deluge  from 
washing  out  Cain's  sin. 

Yet  if  the  deluge  shall  come,  if  the  waters  of  death  shall  prevail 
even  above  the  tops  of  the  highest  mountains,  if  the  nation  shall  be 
wrapped  in  the  flames  of  civil  strife  more  dire  than  any  we  have  yet 
felt,  and  our  indifference  to  the  fate  of  our  brothers  shall  doom  us  to 
a  worse  suffering,  out  of  it  all  shall  the  new  earth  come.  The  del- 
uge shall  pass  away  ;  the  land  of  righteousness,  of  brotherliness,  of 
Christ,  without  caste  or  violence,  or  hatred,  or  disloyalty,  or  murder, 
shall  appear  above  the  flood.    And  then  will  still  gleam  forth,  nay, 


456 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


will  more  brightly  blaze,  the  fame  of  this  just  father,  this  brave  lad, 
this  Cornelian  jewel  of  filial  maidenhood. 

Hope,  then,  sad  hearts  ;  hope  and  endure,  and  be  patient.  Pray 
for  those  who  have  despoiled  your  house  of  its  home,  its  head,  its 
heart.  Pray  for  them  by  name,  pray  for  them  with  all  the  heart. 
So  will  you  be  still  one  household,  for  thus  prays  your  family  in 
heaven.  In  Christ  they  lived,  for  Christ  they  died,  with  Christ  they 
dwell.  Live  ye  in  Christ  in  petition  for  the  forgiveness  of  your  ene- 
mies, so  that,  if  spared  the  martyr's  fate,  you  may  still  rejoice  in  the 
martyr's  crown.  For  thus  you  shall  win  like  honor  from  God,  with 
those  of  your  own  flesh  and  blood  that  have  gone  up — yes,  blessed 
be  the  Lord !  gone  up,  up,  up,  up,  in  human  love  and  reverence,  in 
earthly  fame,  into  heavenly  seats,  through  great  tribulation,  and 
have  washed  their  robes  of  blood,  and  made  them  white  in  the 
bloodier  blood  of  the  Lamb,  who  died  for  them  as  they  died  for  him, 
and  will  make  them  to  reign  with  him  in  peace  and  bliss  forever  and 
forever. 

There  was  no  subject,  apart  from  the  direct  work  of 
preaching  the  Gospel  of  Christ  to  lost  men,  which  enlisted 
more  fully  the  interest  and  labors  of  Bishop  Haven  than 
education  in  the  South.  This  grew  largely  from  life-long 
familiarity  with  the  educational  work  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church.  There  was  not  a  phase  of  that  work 
in  the- North  with  which  he  was  not  familiar.  He  had  re- 
peatedly visited  all  the  chief  centers  of  this  enterprise 
from  ocean  to  ocean,  and  from  the  gulf  to  the  lakes.  Dur- 
ing his  later  years  few  men  in  the  Church  had  so  full  and 
intimate  an  acquaintance  with  the  condition  and  work 
of  such  institutions.  He  was  thoroughly  familiar  with 
every  movement  of  our  educational  work  and  workmen  in 
New  England;  he  knew  every  teacher  and  officer  of  any 
repute  among  them  personally;  and  he  had  borne  a  part 


Bishop  Haven. 


457 


in  the  labors  and  sacrifices  through  which  such  excellent 
results  had  been  achieved.  He  knew  quite  as  well  as 
any  body  the  great  and  perpetual  benediction  which  had 
accrued  to  the  Chureh  and  country  through  these  faith- 
ful activities,  and  he  thought  their  work  had  only  just 
begun,  even  in  the  East. 

When  he  entered  upon  his  episcopal  residence  in  the 
South,  Bishop  Haven  found  a  new  and  wonderful  field 
for  the  work  of  education  in  all  that  region.  For  the 
freedmen  and  the  poor  whites  the  scope  and  needs  of 
the  work  are  best  set  forth  in  his  tract  called 

AX  APPEAL 

Dear  Brethren:  You  have  had  many  private  appeals  to  help 
our  schools  in  the  South.  May  I  ask  you  to  read  these  lines  The 
Conference  year  in  most  of  the  Eastern  and  some  of  the  Western 
work  is  near  its  close.  In  the  crush  of  collections  and  other  busi- 
ness which  comes  at  this  hour,  I  fear  you  will  forget  one  of  the 
chiefest  claims  which  the  Church  has  upon  you.  It  is  that  of  edu- 
cating- our  people  in  the  South.  The  name  given  to  this  work  con- 
tines  it  to  the  freedmen,  but,  I  am  glad  to  say,  the  secretary  of  that 
Society  has  distributed  aid,  irrespective  of  the  former  condition  of 
applicants  ;  still,  the  majority  of  our  students  are  those  who,  ten 
years  ago,  by  the  fortunes  of  w^ar,  became  free  from  bondage,  and 
most  of  our  means  go  to  educate  them.  Let  me  ask  you  to  consider 
these  facts  : 

Practically,  the  work  of  educating  the  freed  youth,  so  far  as  Meth- 
odism is  concerned,  depends  upon  our  Church.  If  we  do  not  do  it, 
it  will  not  be  done  by  Methodists.  Nor  will  it  be  done,  to  any  great 
extent,  by  other  Churches. 

It  is  not  ten  years  yet  since  the  battle-flag  was  furled  ;  not  twelve 

years  since  our  teachers  began  to  penetrate  the  subdued  edges  of 

this  great  territoi-v.    It  was  in  the  winter  of  1863  that  Rev.  Mansfield 
20 


453 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


French  carried  the  first  colony  of  teachers  to  Beaufort,  South  Caro- 
lina. In  this  decade  what  hath  God  wrought  !  We  have  schools 
in  every  Southern  State,  except  Arkansas  and  Kentucky.  Some  of 
them  are  well,  and  have  been  long,  established.  In  1866  I  visited, 
in  Nashville,  the  first,  I  think,  that  was  founded,  through  the  efforts 
of  Bishop  Clark.  It  was  then  conducted  in  an  old  gun  factory.  The 
pupils  were  dressed  in  rags  and  linsey-woolsey  frocks  and  plantation 
shoes.  Not  a  respectable  dress  was  on  any  one  of  them.  They 
came  in  as  they  had  come  out  of  the  house  of  bondage. 

To-day  you  can  see  in  the  Tennesseeans,  singing  through  the  land, 
the  wonderful  change.  Could  you  visit  the  grounds  of  that  college, 
the  Tennessee  Central,  and  see  the  four  fine  brick  buildings  upon 
it,  one  of  them  towering  so  as  to  be  visible  through  all  that  section 
of  the  city  and  surrounding  country,  you,  too,  would  tearfully  and 
gladly  exclaim,  What  hath  God  wrought !  Could  you  visit  the 
school  itself,  see  its  order,  hear  its  recitations,  note  the  dress  and 
manners  of  its  students,  listen  to  its  music,  behold  it  in  its  sports 
and  in  its  social  meetings,  you  would  still  more  rejoice  and  be  ex- 
ceeding glad.  If  you  went  into  the  Conference  you  would  see  its 
influence.  One  of  its  secretaries  and  presiding  elders  is  a  young 
man  of  modest  and  intelligent  bearing,  who  came  out  of  slavery  as 
ignorant  as  any  of  its  victims.  He  entered  this  school,  and  abode 
here  for  several  years.  Now,  clothed,  in  his  right  mind,  he  sits 
among  the  princes  of  his  Israel,  respected  by  every  member,  what- 
ever his  former  prejudices  and  training. 

The  same  is  true  of  the  Conferences  of  Georgia,  Alabama,  Mis- 
sissippi, Louisiana,  and  Texas,  as  well  as  those  on  the  South  Atlan- 
tic coast.  I  have  visited  all  these  Slates,  and  nearly  all  our  schools, 
and  I  can  affirm  that  I  have  never  seen  better  improvement  in  any 
schools  in  the  North  than  I  have  witnessed  here. 

These  schools  feed  our  Church,  and  are  fed  by  it.  Without  them 
we  could  not  push  and  advance  our  work.  With  them  we  leaven 
every  Conference  and  community.  If  you  wish  to  help  Methodist 
education  among  these  our  brethren  in  the  South,  you  must  help 
support  our  Methodist  schools. 


Bishop  Haven. 


459 


These  schools  cannot  yet  pay  their  current  expenses  without  out- 
side help.  Leaving  out  the  erection  of  buildings  and  furnishing 
apparatus  of  the  cheaper  and  only  absolutely  necessary  kind,  they 
cannot  pay  the  salaries  of  the  teachers.  You  must  remember  that 
these  youth  came  into  freedom  almost  as  naked  as  they  came  into 
the  world.  Their  fathers  were  more  beggared  than  themselves,  for 
they  had  age  and  penury.  Your  fathers  helped  you  get  the  only 
education  you  ever  had ;  these  cannot  do  so.  The  young  men  and 
women  have  to  help  themselves.  If.  under  these  circumstances, 
they  can  pay  their  board  they  do  well. 

How,  then,  must  the  teachers  be  supported  ?  By  your  contribu- 
tions. There  is  no  other  possible  way.  If  you  will  not  give  them  the 
little  they  need,  they  must  abandon  the  work,  and  what  a  cry  of  joy 
from  their  foes,  so  many  and  so  active  and  so  powerful;  what  a  cry  of 
sorrow  from  their  friends,  so  many  and  so  poor  and  so  despised,  if 
these  fountains  of  God  be  shut  up  !  You  cannot,  you  must  not,  you 
will  not  allow  it  to  be  done. 

Who  are  these  teachers  }  You  hear  no  good  word  as  to  our  work- 
ers in  this  field.    They  are  all  cursed  with  opprobrious  epithets. 

Never  was  a  greater  falsehood  screamed  into  the  ears  of  a  thought- 
less nation.  Look  at  these  teachers.  I  speak  not  of  the  scholars  of 
Yale  and  Amherst  and  other  famous  schools,  in  charge  of  our  Con- 
gregational institutions,  men  of  the  highest  merit  as  students,  but  of 
our  own  teachers.  Here  are  graduates  of  Middletown,  one  or  two 
of  whom  were  her  valedictorians  ;  of  Delaware,  to  one  of  whom  she 
gave  last  year  the  title  of  Doctor  of  Divinity  ;  of  Indiana  Asbury ; 
of  Evanston  ;  of  the  State  University  of  Wisconsin,  in  which  college 
one  held  a  place  as  instructor  after  his  graduation,  a  high  approval  of 
the  faculty  ;  of  the  Boston  School  of  Theology,  and  of  many  other 
institutions.  One  has  been  among  our  most  successful  educators. 
He  was  president  of  a  college,  and  head  for  ten  years  of  our  oldest 
and  largest  seminary.  Yet  another  has  just  left  the  presidency  of  a 
Northern  college  for  work  among  this  people,  and  from  the  bayous  of 
Louisiana  appeals  to  you  to  sustain  him  in  his  perilous  work.  Will 
you  let  them  cry  and  labor  in  vain  ? 


460 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


This  is  the  class  of  men  and  women,  who  can  command  good 
salaries  in  the  North,  that  are  working  for  their  bread  among  these 
downtrodden  brethren.  Will  you  not  supply  that  bread  ?  A  i)rother 
last  year  was  urged  to  take  a  city  appointment  worth  from  two  thou- 
sand dollars  to  two  thousand  five  hundred  dollars  and  parsonage. 
Here  he  and  his  wife  live  in  one  room,  eat  and  drink  with  their 
pupils,  and  would  rejoice  to  receive  half  that  salary. 

Such  are  the  heroes  who  are  building  up  the  Church  on  the  divine 
foundations  throughout  all  this  land.  Will  you  stand  by  them  ? 
You  will,  I  know  your  hearts  bleed  in  sympathy  with  the  oppressed 
who  in  their  own  persons,  more  vividly  than  any  other  people  on  the 
earth,  reproduce  the  condition  of  Christ,  the  Master  and  Saviour 
and  God,  when  he  was  upon  the  earth.  "They  are  without  form  or 
comeliness.  When  we  see  them,  there  is  no  beauty  that  we  should 
desire  them  They  are  despised  and  rejected  of  men.  We  hide,  as 
it  were,  our  faces  from  them.  They  are  despised  and  we  esteem 
them  not." 

How  true  this  is  !  Shall  it  be  so  any  longer  ?  Nay !  you  will  see 
Christ  in  the  burdened  and  heavy  laden,  and  run  to  His  relief. 
"  Whosoever  doeih  it  unto  one  of  the  least  of  these  my  brethren, 
doeth  it  unto  me." 

How  can  you  do  it  ?  Very  easily.  Put  money  into  this  treasury. 
We  have  no  more  economically  or  wisely  managed  society  than  this. 
Every  Church  can  take  a  collection.  If  each  of  my  brethren  in  the 
ministry  will  read  this  appeal— or  make  a  better  one  himself— from 
his  pulpit,  and  give  the  people  a  chance,  we  can  get  out  of  peril  and 
into  deep  water  in  one  Sunday.  Don't  shove  this  by.  It  will  inter- 
fere with  no  other  collection,  with  no  other  duty.  We  must  have 
one  hundred  thousand  dollars  to  keep  this  work  moving  on  its 
present  lines.  We  should  have  thrice  that  to  properly  develop  it 
according  to  its  immediate  necessities. 

If  we  are  not  quick  and  generous  in  this  work  the  Romanists  will 
take  our  crown.  Already  they  are  putting  forth  unexampled  eftorts 
to  secure  this  prize.  They  are  spending  treasures,  and  sending 
forward  men  and  women  devoted  exclusively  to  this  work.    A  lead- 


Bishop  Haven. 


461 


ing  gentleman  of  color,  Mr.  Downing,  approves  their  course,  and 
urges  his  friends  to  patronize  their  schools.  We  can  have  them  if 
We  will.  But  they  must  and  will  be  educated,  and  if  we  refuse  to 
support  and  advance  our  schools,  they  will  take  the  prize  from  us. 
If  they  do,  they  take  the  South ;  for  to-day  the  Romanists  have 
more  friends  among  the  whites  than  any  other  Church.  These 
youths  are  ours  to-day.  It  remains  with  you  to  say  whether  they 
shall  continue  to  be. 

In  behalf  of  these  excellent  but  needy  institutions 
Mr.  Haven's  labors  were  incessant  and  very  efficient. 
In  the  first  place  he  visited  them  all  and  made  himself 
acquainted  with  their  internal  condition  and  working. 
He  personally  knew  all  the  leading  actors  in  this  great 
movement.  He  won  their  confidence  by  his  comprehen- 
sion of  their  field  of  work,  the  soundness  of  his  judgment 
respecting  its  general  administration,  and  his  ready  and 
helpful  aid  in  emergencies.  He  was  ready  to  preach  to 
them  ;  lecture  on  political,  reformatory^  and  literary  top- 
ics ;  and  give  addresses  on  all  kinds  of  public  and  cere- 
monial days.  On  such  visits  it  was  rare  that  he  did  not 
drop  some  wise  suggestion  to  fructify  in  the  minds  of 
the  managers  of  these  schools. 

Then  he  put  the  claims  of  these  new  institutions 
before  the  Church  with  a  patience,  perseverance  and 
attractiveness  which  few  could  equal.  He  was  not 
content  v/ith  stimulating  the  public  in  this  general  way 
to  generous  gifts,  but  he  gave  of  his  own  resources  with 
great  liberality.  How  much  he  gave  in  all  these  ways 
cannot  be  told,  for  his  Journal  gives  us  only  a  little  light 
in  incidental  ways.    His  gifts  to  Wesleyan  University 


462  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

and  Boston  University  were  very  large  for  his  means. 
He  made  a  large  subscription  to  the  Maiden  Church  and 
also  to  the  People's  Church,  Boston.  But,  in  addition  to 
these  claims,  which  would  have  seemed  to  many  more 
than  enough,  he  gave  to  churches  and  schools  in  the 
South  at  a  rate  that  few  ever  matched. 

It  was  almost  inevitable  that  Bishop  Haven  should 
arouse  anger  and  provoke  unkind  feeling  on  the  part  of 
many  Southern  Methodists  by  the  freedom  and  vivid- 
ness of  his  portrayals  of  the  political  and  religious  state 
of  that  region.  It  was  no  pleasure  to  him  to  hold  up  the 
sins  and  iniquities  of  the  South  to  public  scorn  and  con- 
tempt. But  he  saw  what  he  saw  and  felt  bound  to  report 
to  the  country  facts  which  some  disputed  the  existence  of 
and  others  wished  to  get  out  of  sight.  He  waged  many 
a  sharp  fight  on  public  questions  by  simply  telling  facts 
and  truths  which  fell  under  his  notice.  A  more  frater- 
nal Christian  never  lived.  To  have  seen  a  real  union  of 
all  real  Christians  would  have  thrilled  his  soul  with 
rapture  as  a  sure  token  of  a  speedy  millennium.  But  he 
did  not  deem  it  possible  to  help  on  such  an  event  either 
by  admitting  the  papal  supremacy  or  joining  the  Epis- 
copal Church,  since  that  would  be  rather  formal  than 
true  union.  The  only  real  union  was  a  union  in  Chris- 
tian love ;  where  this  love  did  not  exist,  outward  union 
would  be  merely  a  form. 

When  attempts  were  put  afoot  to  bring  about  formal 
fraternization"  between  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church 
and  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  South,  the  criti- 
cism he  made  was  that  it  was  too  "  formal  "  to  be  real. 


Bishop  Haven.  463 

He  met  all  such  attempts  to  bring  about  an  apparent 
union  with  the  demand  that  it  should  be  made  real. 
He  judged  too  well  that  a  fraternity  of  Christians  of  all 
races,  nations,  and  colors  would  be  repugnant  to  many 
who  would  not  dare  to  take  the  resolution  to  oppose 
the  movement.  He  showed  the  kindness  of  his  own 
heart  by  giving  various  kinds  of  aid  to  Southern  Meth- 
odist enterprises  and  schemes.  He  was  made  the  vic- 
tim of  Southern  ill-feehng  at  the  Southern  General 
Conference,  at  its  session  in  Atlanta,  because  of  his  dis- 
like for  the  unfraternal  course  of  the  South  toward  the 
colored  man.  He  knew  that  perhaps  he  alone  of  all  the 
Northern  Bishops  would  have  encountered  the  unfrater- 
nal reception  that  befell  him.  He  did  not  complain  of 
the  personal  and  official  discourtesy  which  he  had  to 
undergo.  He  knew  that  it  would  all  react  upon  the 
Church,  and  lead  to  the  demand  on  all  sides  that  fra- 
ternity should  itself  be  fraternal  to  all  men  of  good-will. 
The  thing  has  turned  out  as  he  foresaw  it  would. 

At  one  time  he  made  himself  responsible  to  raise 
$7,000  for  the  magnificent  site  of  Clark  University  at 
Atlanta.  It  is  quite  probable  that  he  raised  the  whole 
amount,  since  he  had  obtained  one  half  of  it  in  a  few 
months.  He  was  pledged  to  raise  §10,000  for  the  new 
and  beautiful  building  now  erected  on  the  campus  which 
his  own  sagacity  and  generosity  had  thus  wisely  provided. 
One  reason  for  the  lecturing  trips  so  frequently  under- 
taken at  this  period  was  the  need  of  extra  funds  to  meet 
all  these  emergencies.  And  the  incessant  correspond- 
ence for  newspapers  of  which  one  critic  complained,  and 


4^4  Life  of  Gilberi'  1Ia\ex. 

over  which,  in  its  comprehensiveness,  one  may  well  be 
astounded,  had  partly  a  similar  motive  behind  it.  He 
was  the  most  trusted  adviser  of  the  colored  people  on 
this  as  on  all  other  subjects,  and  he  impressed  his  views 
upon  them  w  ith  such  energy  that  they  are  sure  long  to 
retain  that  instruction.  Nothing  pleased  him  better 
than  to  witness  their  success  on  these  lines,  and  he  noted 
dov/n,  as  a  red-letter  day,  the  time  when  a  colored  con- 
gregation contributed  seven  hundred  dollars  for  such  a 
purpose.  It  is  needless  to  say  that  this  work  gives 
promise  of  the  largest  success  in  the  immediate  future. 
He  was  anxious  that  all  these  institutions  of  learning 
should  open  all  their  gates  to  all  colors  and  both  sexes. 
He  did  much  to  create  or  fan  such  convictions  in  the 
teachers,  students,  and  trustees  of  our  Southern  schools. 

Bishop  Warren  said,  in  speaking  of  Bishop  Haven's 
interest  in  the  cause  of  education,  "To  his  wise  counsels 
the  Church  owes  the  devotion  of  the  wealth  of  Isaac 
Rich  to  the  founding  of  Boston  University."  Rev.  V.  A. 
Cooper  also  says,  "  He  labored  long  to  induce  Isaac  Rich 
to  will  his  large  property  for  that  purpose."  Not  having 
been  very  familiar  with  the  birth  of  Boston  University, 
v.  e  cannot  say  very  definitely  who  deserves  the  honor 
here  assigned  Bishop  Haven,  but  what  he  himself  told 
the  writer  v.-as  of  a  somewhat  different  tenor.  As  IMr. 
Rich  had  no  children,  and  his  next  of  kin  did  not  seem 
to  him  equal  to  the  wise  administration  of  so  large  an 
estate,  he  had  long  cherished  the  purpose  of  devoting 
the  property  to  the  advancement  of  education  in  the 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church.     Seven  years  before  his 


Bishop  Haven.  46$ 

death  Mr.  Rich  had  not  made  his  will.  Had  he  died 
then,  the  law  would  have  given  all  that  vast  property  to 
his  kinsmen.  This  was  what  Mr.  Haven,  in  common 
with  many  others,  dreaded  and  tried  to  avert. 

The  first  time  Mr.  Haven  came  to  Boston,  after  his 
serious  illness  in  1865,  he  went  to  Mr.  Rich's  residence. 
j\Ir.  Rich  took  him  out  to  drive,  in  company  with  Mrs. 
Rich,  in  their  private  carriage.  The  will  was  on  Mr. 
Haven's  mind,  though  how  to  get  in  some  reference  to 
it  he  could  not.  see.  Finally  he  purposely  mentioned 
the  fact  that  he  had  given  a  certain  broker  $500  to  in- 
vest for  him,  and  that  the  investment  had  turned  out 
worthless.  Mr.  Rich  said,  in  pleasant  banter,  That's 
just  like  you  Methodist  preachers,  you  don't  know  how 
to  take  care  of  money  when  you  get  it."  Mr.  Haven  was 
properly  humble  in  view  of  his  bad  luck,  but  pleaded 
that  many  laymen  were  no  wiser. 

Business  men  are,"  responded  Rich. 

"  Not  all  business  men,"  said  Haven. 

*'  All  that  know  any  thing,"  said  Rich. 

"Did  you  never  make  a  bad  investment?"  queried 
Haven. 

Sometimes,  but  mine  are  mostly  good." 
Haven  then  said,  hesitatingly,  as  if  groping  after  some 
argument  which  would  leave  him  victor  in  the  wordy 
war, 

"  I  don't  carry  around  two  millions  of  dollars  in  my 

pocket  which  may  all  go  to  the  fishes  some  day  for  not 

making  my  will."     Haven  added,     Perhaps  you  have 

made  your  will  ;  and  then  I  shall  take  it  all  back," 
20* 


466  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

But  Rich  said,  "  No,  there  is  no  will." 

Not  very  long  after  this  sally  Mr.  Rich  told  Haven 
that  he  would  make  his  will  after  a  certain  number  of 
months.  When  the  months  had  long  ago  elapsed.  Ha- 
ven said, 

By  the  way,  Brother  Rich,  have  you  made  your  will 
yet  ?  " 
No." 

I  knew  you  wouldn't  when  you  said  so." 
The  subject  continued  an  open  one  between  them, 
notwithstanding  its  delicacy.  Mrs.  Rich  joined  her 
urgency  with  Haven's,  and  she  finally  brought  the 
matter  to  decision  by  saying  she  would  not  go  off  on 
some  proposed  excursion  with  the  will  unmade.  Under 
this  pressure  Mr.  Rich  one  day  suddenly  made  the  will, 
and  never  again  saw  it  during  his  life.  Mr.  Haven  told 
a  friend  that  he  never  dared  to  suggest  that  the  money 
should  be  given  to  Boston  University  or  Wesleyan,  since 
raising  that  question  would  involve  discussion  and  bring 
delay.  He  did  suggest  the  propriety  of  Rich's  giving 
Dr.  Cummings  a  legacy,  in  recognition  of  their  long 
friendship,  a  suggestion  which  was  acted  on.  That  Mr. 
Haven  liked  the  notion  of  a  great  Christian  institution 
of  learning  in  the  city  of  Boston  all  know  who  knew 
him  in  those  days.  His  interest  in  the  project  grew 
with  his  dreams  about  it,  and  finally  became  so  warm 
that  Rev.  V.  A.  Cooper  says : 

Brother  Rich  died.  He  lay  uncoffined  for  the  grave.  Mr.  Haven, 
then  editor,  came  to  spend  the  Sabbath  with  me  at  Nashua.  At 
Lowell  he  met  Dr.  Ela,  who  told  him  that  it  was  currently  reported 


Bishop  Haven. 


467 


that,  after  all,  the  great  property  was  turned  over  to  Wesleyan  Univer- 
sity, wliere  many  thought  it  ought  to  go.  The  report  greatly  dis- 
turbed his  mind,  and  was  his  constant  theme  in  conversation.  .  .  . 
He  said,  "  I  have  reached  a  conclusion  ;  my  mind  is  made  up.  If 
that  money  is  diverted  I  will  not  accept  the  episcopacy  if  it  is  offered 
to  me  ;  I  will  not  look  at  it.  .  .  .  I'll  collect  the  money  and  found  a 
Methodist  University  in  Boston." 

Mr.  Haven  had  a  large  influence  in  the  early  history 
of  that  promising  institution. 

His  interest  in  his  own  alvia  mater  was  unusual.  He 
was  very  rarely  absent  from  her  commencements,  and 
he  contributed  his  full  share  to  the  pleasures  and  inter- 
est of  those  occasions.  He  wrote  with  enthusiasm  to 
learn  of  her  internal  condition  and  progress,  and  what- 
ever he  knew  he  was  fairly  sure  to  tell  the  world.  He 
was  greatly  pleased  over  his  election  as  trustee  not  long 
before  his  death.  He  was  a  very  cheerful  prophet  of 
her  greater  prosperity  in  coming  days.  How  he  would 
have  triumphed  over  her  recent  splendid  advances  in 
money  and  reputation! 

One  of  the  striking  traits  of  Gilbert  Haven's  mind 
showed  itself  in  his  relations  to  reformers  who  stood 
outside  of  the  Christian  fold,  but  who  showed  great 
fidelity  to  some,  perhaps  neglected,  Christian  ideas. 
We  have  seen  this  trait  appear  in  his  relations  with 
Governor  Andrew.  It  showed  itself  in  his  articles  on 
Charles  Sumner,  William  Lloyd  Garrison,  and  George 
Thompson.  The  only  person  of  this  class  with  whom 
he  ever  grew  intimate  was  Mr.  William  S.  Robinson. 
Mr.  Robinson  was  a  neighbor  of  Mr.  Haven's  at  Mai- 


46S  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

den  during  his  later  years,  and  the  pair  were  drawn  to- 
gether through  their  common  interest  in  pubHc  affairs 
and  their  intense  devotion  to  the  spread  and  practical 
embodiment  of  the  great  doctrines  of  human  liberty, 
equality,  and  fraternity.  Whenever  Mr.  Haven  re- 
turned home  from  his  long  episcopal  tours  he  found  a 
means  of  grace  and  a  source  of  refreshment  in  talks  with 
Mr.  Robinson  as  well  as  in  the  public  and  private  relig- 
ious gatherings  he  attended.  This  quiet  gentleman  knew 
the  whole  round  of  American  politics  as  but  few  did, 
while  in  Massachusetts  nothing  escaped  his  notice.  In- 
timate with  Sumner,  Wilson,  Andrew,  Phillips,  and 
many  other  leaders  of  opinion,  he  had  gradually  be- 
come a  power  in  Massachusetts  politics.  He  was  for 
many  years  Clerk  of  the  Massachusetts  House  of  Rep- 
resentatives, a  position  which  allowed  him  to  use  his 
talent  for  political  writing  for  the  noblest  ends. 

Under  the  7iom  de  plume  of  "  Warrington,"  Mr.  Rob- 
inson discussed  public  affairs  and  men  in  a  series  of 
brilliant  letters  written  for  The  Springfield  Repub- 
lican." His  genius  and  work  were  thus  described  after 
his  death  by  Bishop  Haven  under  the  heading  War- 
rington :" 

He  was  pre-eminently  the  political  letter-writer.  No  such  shafts 
fled  from  any  other  bow  as  those  his  arm  discharged.  They  were 
fleadly,  but  never  venomous.  His  arrows  were  sharp  in  the  heart  of 
the  king's  enemies.  His  letters  were  strong  in  thought,  curt  in  style, 
full  of  sense  and  satire,  and,  though  deficient  in  the  aroma  that 
classic  scholarship  sends  forth,  were  not  without  high  claims  as 
literary  efforts.    They  were  full  of  personalities.     Men  were  not 


Bishop  Haven. 


469 


hidden  behind  the  arras  of  compliment  and  general  remark.  Many  of 
these  personalities  provoked  bad  blood,  or  would  have  done  so  but 
for  the  seeming  lack  of  personal  feeling  in  the  w^riter.  He  sat  as 
judge,  and  weighed  these  men  in  his  golden  balances  as  imperturb- 
ably  as  Rhadamanthus  decided  the  fates  of  those  who  appeared 
before  his  seat  of  judgment.  Some  of  the  victims  impaled  on  his 
pencil-spear  writhed  fearfully.  He  struck  the  members  of  the  very 
house  he  served,  if  in  his  judgment  they  deserved  that  fate. 

This  work  was  not  executed  in  malice,  but  undoubtedly,  in  his 
own  conscience,  with  the  highest  sense  of  duty.  He  was  only  test- 
ing every  man's  work,  of  what  .sort  it  was.  Like  Socrates,  he  was 
trying  it,  not  to  show  himself,  but  itself.  He  never  dwelt  long  on 
one  he  praised  or  blamed.  Said  Charles  Sumner,  "  He  has  the  best 
French  gift  of  *  touch  and  go,'  of  which  About  is  the  master."  " 

After  showing  that  Mr.  Robinson  had  very  serious 
limitations  in  his  bearing  toward  prohibition  and  similar 
reforms,  and  stating  that  his  early  religious  training  and 
views  had  been  far  from  orthodox,  Bishop  Haven  con- 
tinues : 

His  religious  views  widened  as  his  later  days  put  him  among 
cheerful  and  orthodox  Christians. 

"  I  shall  show  St.  Peter  my  receipts  for  pew-rent  in  a  Methodist 
Church,"  he  said,  "and  that  will  secure  me  admission." 

"You  will  die  like  Montaigne,  with  the  wafer  between  your  teeth," 
said  a  clerical  friend. 

He  almost  did  die  thus. 

"  I  have  been  mumbling  my  prayers,"  he  said  to  the  same  friend 
last  autumn. 

May  we  not  hope  that  "  mumbling"  was  articulate  in  the  ears  of 
his  Saviour  and  his  God  ? 

When  death  smote  this  true  man,  Bishop  Haven  sent 
the  following  characteristic  letter  to  the  widow: 


470 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


My  Dear  Mrs.  Robinson — I  have  just  read  the  dreadful  tele- 
gram. The  Lord  bless  and  comfort  you  and  the  children !  A  no- 
bler soul  in  integrity  and  adhesion  to  the  truth,  as  he  understood  it, 
ne'er  wore  flesh  about  him.  That  soul,  I  feel,  did  lay  hold  on  the 
highest  truth  unto  eternal  life.  I  need  not  tell  you  how  much  I 
sympathize  with  you.    You  will  now  realize  it. 

Your  most  sympathizing  friend  and  brother, 

G.  Haven. 

1018  Arch  Street,  Philadelphia,  March  11,  1876. 

The  missionary  zeal  which  was  kindled  up  into  so  hot 
a  flame  during  Mr.  Haven's  pastorate  at  Wilbraham  as 
to  lead  him  to  think  seriously  of  entering  on  the  foreign 
missionary  work  had  a  fine  occasion  to  operate  during  his 
service  as  Bishop.  He  had  an  excellent  chance  to  learn 
all  about  the  details  of  the  administration  in  the  yearly 
meetings  of  the  Missionary  Board  at  New  York.  It  also 
fell  to  him  to  visit  Mexico  and  Liberia  inspecting  mis- 
sionary work.  He  had  the  high  honor  of  founding  the 
Mexican  Mission  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church. 
He  carried  with  him  not  only  letters  of  recommendation 
to  various  representatives  of  the  United  States  Govern- 
ment there,  but  also  others  which  opened  his  way  into 
some  Mexican  families.  Mr.  Sumner  and  other  eminent 
men  kindly  aided  Bishop  Haven  in  this  way.  Opening 
so  new  and  broad  a  field  of  labor  for  the  Church,  Mr. 
Haven  thought  best  to  pay  a  formal  visit  to  the  Presi- 
dent of  Mexico  and  explain  to  him  the  scope  and  aims 
of  his  mission.  Presented  by  Mr.  Nelson,  the  American 
Minister,  he  was  very  kindly  received  by  President 
Lerdo.  The  latter  declared  that  religious  liberty  is  the 
law  of  the  land,  and  that  he  should  steadily  welcome 


Bishop  Haven. 


471 


the  new  mission,  and  protect  the  missionaries  in  the 
enjoyment  of  all  their  civil  rights.  This  was  an  official 
announcement  of  the  changed  policy  of  the  Mexican 
Government. 

Rev.  William  Butler,  D.D.,  who  founded  our  Church 
in  India,  was  put  in  charge  of  the  Mexican  work.  This 
mission  made  a  vigorous  start,  and  has  gone  onward 
with  wise  leadership  to  a  prominent  position  in  the  list 
of  the  Church's  missions.  So  vigorous  was  the  begin- 
ning that  some  conservative  minister  was  provoked  into 
saying  that  Bishop  Haven  was  a  man  of  large  indiscre- 
tion, and  had  used  it  all  in  Mexico.  The  progress  of  that 
work  has,  nevertheless,  amply  vindicated  his  courageous 
administration. 

On  his  return  he  attended  the  next  meeting  of  the 
Missionary  Board  at  New  York,  and  presented  a  report, 
from  which  we  take  the  following  items : 

REPORT  OF  THE  STATE  OF  OUR  WORK  IN  MEXICO. 

I  started  for  Mexico  exactly  a  week  after  the  adjournment  of  the 
meeting  of  the  Board  of  Bishops.  I  reached  Vera  Cruz,  via  New 
Orleans  and  Havana,  on  Saturday,  December  28.  I  had  the  privi- 
lege of  inaugurating  Protestant  worship  in  that  city  on  the  Sunday 
evening  following,  in  the  rooms  of  the  American  Consul,  generously 
offered  for  this  service.    Nearly  thirty  persons  were  present. 

From  this  city  I  started  on  a  tour  of  inspection  that  occupied  over 
three  months,  and  in  which  I  traveled  nearly  twenty-four  hundred 
miles,  fifteen  hundred  of  which  were  on  horseback  or  in  stages.  I 
visited  three  of  the  chief  towns  near  the  capital,  Puebla,  Pachuca^ 
and  Caernervaca,  and  I  went  through  the  land  from  the  City  of 
Mexico  to  Matamoras,  adding  to  this  main  line  an  excursion  of  one 
hundred  and  fifty  miles  to  Guanajuato  and  Leon. 


472 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


I  reached  the  city  of  Mexico  on  the  Friday  succeeding  my  arrival 
at  Vera  Cruz,  and  immediately  proceeded  to  inspect  the  properties 
in  the  market. 

Good  fortune  attended  the  important  enterprise.  The  cloisters  of 
San  Francisco  are  a  beautiful  square  of  marble  columns  two  stories 
high,  with  deep  corridors  behind  them.  They  are  roofed  in,  and  have 
been  occupied  as  a  place  of  amusement  for  several  years,  most  of  the 
time  with  very  poor  success.  They  were  owned  by  three  parties  and 
leased  by  a  fourth.  The  chief  owner  was  abroad,  and  the  first 
mortgagee  had  died,  and  his  widow  lived  at  San  Luis  Potosi,  a  dis- 
tance of  four  days'  journey.  There  were,  therefore,  especial  diffi- 
culties engirting  its  purchase,  even  under  ordinary  opposition.  But 
to  these  were  joined  the  activity  of  the  Romish  priesthood,  and  their 
ability  and  willingness  to  make  any  sacrifice  of  money  to  prevent 
our  getting  a  foothold,  besides  the  possible  and  probable  unwilling- 
ness of  some  of  these  many  owners  and  controllers  of  the  property 
to  dispose  of  it  to  our  Church.  It  was  evidently,  therefore,  a  hazard- 
ous undertaking  to  encleavor  to  secure  this  beautiful  structure. 
The  negotiations  for  its  purchase  were  begun  the  middle  of  January, 
and  it  was  not  until  the  first  week  in  April  that  a  telegram  to  Mata- 
moras  assured  me  that  the  papers  were  passed  and  the  property 
ours.  This  beautiful  auditorium  is  a  square  of  about  a  hundred 
feet.  It  has  a  front  of  eighty  feet  by  forty,  which  can  be  utilized  as 
school-rooms,  class-rooms,  and  possibly  as  a  residence  for  a  mission- 
nry.  It  will  require  an  outlay  of  three  to  four  thousand  dollars  to 
fit  it  up  wMth  these  conveniences.  Its  original  cost  cannot  be  known, 
can  hardly  be  valued.  It  could  not  be  built  for  a  hundred  thousand 
dollars.  When  the  Government  confiscated  it.  it  was  appraised,  I 
believe,  at  thirty  thousand  dollars.  The  first  purchaser  expended, 
it  was  said,  ten  thousand  dollars  in  putting  a  roof  upon  it,  and  other- 
wise adapting  it  to  an  audience.  It  was  purchased  by  us  for  sixteen 
thousand  three  hundred  dollars. 

The  property  is  situated  in  the  center  of  the  city,  in  its  most  act- 
ive and  prosperous  section.  It  cannot  fail  to  increase  in  value,  and 
prove  a  very  important  basis  for  the  development  of  our  work. 


Bishop  Haven. 


473 


The  property  not  coming  immediately  into  our  hands,  efforts  were 
made  in  various  directions  to  secure  a  place  for  commencing  wor- 
ship. This  was  the  more  necessary  from  the  fact  that  two  native 
Mexican  preachers  had  joined  our  Church— Rev.  Dr.  Ramirez  and 
Rev.  Gabriel  Ponce  de  Leon.  The  former  asked  to  have  his  name 
inserted  in  the  class-book  as  a  member  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church  on  Sunday,  January  i8,  1873,  only  three  weeks  after  my 
arrival  in  the  city  ;  the  latter  joined  about  two  weeks  subsequently. 
The  former  was  educated  as  a  Dominican  friar,  receiving  part  of  his 
early  training  at  a  Roman  Catholic  school  near  Mobile.  He  was 
held  in  high  esteem  in  his  former  Church,  having  served  as  a  su- 
perintendent of  missions  in  Southern  California,  and,  it  is  said,  was 
offered  a  bishopric  in  that  region  if  he  would  remain  in  that  Church. 
The  other  brother.  Rev.  Ponce  de  Leon,  is  of  secular  training.  A 
business  man  of  the  city,  industrious  and  prosperous— a  hatter  by 
trade— his  mind  became  illumined  by  the  Holy  Spirit  through  ihc 
reading  of  the  Scriptures,  and  he  cast  away  his  idolatrous  images 
and  commenced  to  preach  the  riches  of  Christ.  They  are  fervent 
gospel  preachers,  and  will,  I  trust,  be  instruments  in  bringing  many 
to  the  fold  of  Christ. 

These  acquisitions  rendered  it  desirable,  if  possible,  to  secure  a 
hall  for  worship.  One  only  could  be  found.  This  was  hired  and 
used  partially  for  a  month,  but  its  surroundings  and  entrances  made 
it  difficult  to  popularize  it,  and  it  was  abandoned  at  the  close  of  that 
time.  Our  meeting  was  transferred  to  Dr.  Butler's  house,  where  we 
had  a  goodly  attendance  of  twenty,  and  even  more,  for  two  weeks, 
when,  by  the  favor  of  Bishop  Keener,  we  were  allowed  the  use  of  a 
chapel  which  he  had  bought  for  his  Church,  we  paying  for  certain 
fixtures  and  furnishing  in  lieu  of  rent.  That  arrangement,  I  under- 
stand, still  continues,  as  our  own  property  is  still  held  by  the  lessee. 

In  that  chnpel  "  The  Mission  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church," 
ns  it  was  announced,  began  its  public  worship  on  the  last  Sabbath  in 
March,  with  an  audience  of  about  seventy  natives  in  the  morning,  and 
twenty  foreigners  in  the  afternoon.  The  morning  service  was  con- 
ducted by  Rev.  Dr.  Ramirez,  and  the  afternoon  by  Rev.  Dr.  Butler. 


474 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


No  less  remarkable  has  been  our  progress  at  Pachuca.  This 
is  a  mining  city,  sixty  miles  from  Mexico.  It  has  about  thirty-five 
thousand  inhabitants.  It  has  not  less  than  three  hundred  English 
residents,  and  from  fifty  to  sixty  English  children.  These  families 
are  largely  Methodist  in  their  origin,  being  chiefly  from  Cornwall, 
England.  Class-meetings  have  been  maintained  among  them  lor 
years,  led  by  a  venerable  Wesleyan,  Richard  Rule,  Esq. 

I  visited  this  place,  spent  a  Sabbath,  baptized  three  children, 
administered  the  sacrament,  and  inspected  the  question  of  church 
sites.  A  Spanish  congregation  had  already  been  gathered  through 
the  labors  of  a  physician.  Dr.  Guerre,  who  took  the  charge  of  it 
without  any  salary.  This  congregation  accepted  our  watch-care. 
Dr.  Butler  has  since  visited  them,  and  reports  two  congregations 
besides  these,  one  Spanish,  one  English,  gathered  at  Real  del  Monte, 
six  miles  from  Pachuca,  and  also  the  offer  of  a  very  eligible  and  cen- 
tral corner  lot  on  a  plaza,  separated  from  the  main  square  by  a  rivu- 
let, which  lot  and  buildings  can  be  bought  for  thirty-five  hundred 
dollars.    Dr.  Butler  pleads  for  this  purchase  in  most  eloquent  terms. 

I  can  only  echo  this  appeal.  Silver  and  gold  have  I  none.  The 
Church  has.  The  cr>^  is  not  too  importunate.  The  opening  is  of 
the  highest  importance.  This  call,  and  others  like  unto  it  from  this 
source,  warrant,  in  my  judgment,  a  special  appeal  to  the  Church  for 
funds  for  this  remarkably  opening  work.  I  entreat  you,  brethren, 
to  send  forth  such  an  appeal. 

The  case  of  Puebla  is  different,  but  hardly  less  important.  This 
sacred  city  of  the  countr)-,  situated  a  hundred  and  twenty  miles  east 
of  the  capital,  contains  a  population  of  not  less  than  sixty  thousand 
inhabiiants.  It  is  a  city  of  beauty,  culture  and  wealth.  It  is,  how- 
ever, intensely  Romanist.  We  judged  it  right  to  effect  an  entrance 
there.  Providence  favored  us.  A  situation  in  the  very  heart  of  the 
city  was  secured,  about  a  hundred  and  fifty  feet  front  by  a  hundred 
deep. 

A  chapel,  about  seventy  by  twenty,  is  on  the  rear  of  the  lot,  ready 
for  occupation  when  a  stair-way  shall  have  been  built.  The  rest 
of  the  property  can  be  utilized  for  school,  store,  mission  house,  and 


Bishop  Haven. 


475 


ultimately  for  a  church.  For  this  property  ten  thousand  dollars  was 
paid — three  thousand  dollars  down,  the  rest  in  one  thousand  dollar 
installments  at  the  end  of  ninety  days,  and  every  succeeding  sixty 
days,  without  interest.  It  will  take  about  thirty-five  hundred  dollars 
to  put  this  property  in  complete  order,  and  give  us  a  most  valuable 
property,  at  less  than  a  fourth  of  its  cost,  in  the  heart  of  this  influen- 
tial city,  I  also  urgently  entreat  your  liberal  consideration  of  this 
ver)'  important  enterprise.  We  have  the  men  willing  to  go  there, 
men  who  have  risked,  and  will  again  risk,  in  that  very  city,  their 
lives  for  the  Lord  Jesus.  A  company  of  devout  worshipers  awaits 
our  coming.  May  we  soon  hear  good  tidings  of  great  joy  from  this 
City  of  the  Angels,  as  it  is  popularly  called  ! 

Orizava,  eighty  miles  above  Vera  Cruz,  has  also  begged  us  to 
plant  a  mission  there.  Nineteen  Mexicans  joined  in  this  request. 
Dr.  Cooper's  health  forbidding  his  continued  residence  in  the  city 
of  Mexico,  he  has  gone  to  take  charge  of  our  work  in  that  city.  It 
is  beautiful  for  location,  amid  the  grandest  of  scenen-,  with  every 
luxury  for  every  sense. 

The  summar)'  of  our  work  at  present  is  as  follows  :  Two  congre- 
gations are  gathered  at  Real  del  Monte,  two  also  at  Pachuca,  three 
in  Mexico— one  English  and  two  Spanish — besides  preaching  regu- 
larly near  one  of  the  gates  of  the  city,  in  a  dwelling-house,  under  the 
charge  of  Brother  Ponce  de  Leon.  Other  places  are  being  opened. 
Not  less  than  nine  congregations  are  thus  already  under  our  charge, 
and  our  superintendent  has  not  been  in  the  countr}-  three  months. 
Other  places  are  offered,  and  we  only  need  means  to  have  fifty  such 
charges  before  the  year  shall  close. 

But  this  work  about  the  political  center  should  not  blind  us  to  the 
necessity  of  going  into  the  upper  portions  of  this  country.  A  ride  of 
over  a  thousand  miles  in  a  stage  from  Mexico  to  Matamoras  led  us 
through  many  large  and  important  towns.  These  should  be  occupied 
instantly  by  our  preachers.  Oueretaro,  a  beautifully  located  city  of 
thirty  to  forty  thousand  inhabitants,  should  be  made  a  center  of  our 
work.  It  is  a  hundred  and  fifty  miles  from  the  capital,  and  is  itself 
the  nucleus  of  many  villages  and  large  towns.    Property  can  be 


4/6 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


bought  very  cheap  in  the  very  heart  of  the  town — the  ruins  of  con- 
vents— which  a  little  expense  can  make  ready  for  our  immediate  use. 

But  more  important  than  this  is  the  center  that  commands  a  group 
of  large  cities,  which,  when  I  left  the  countr)*,  were  without  a  mission- 
ary. One  hundred  miles  north-west  of  Oueretaro  is  the  very  flourish- 
ing city  of  Guanajuata,  a  mining  town  of  60,000  inhabitants,  the  rich- 
est and  most  active  in  all  the  countn*.  Fifty  miles  farther  west  is  the 
iarming  city  of  Leon,  with  not  less  than  eighty  to  one  hundred  thou- 
sand inhabitants.  Thirty-six  miles  still  farther  west  is  the  city  of 
Lagos,  of  18,000  inhabitants,  and  about  two  days'  ride  from  this 
place  is  Guadalaxara,  the  chief  city  in  beaut\'.  culture,  and  wealth  of 
all  the  country  except  Puebla  and  Mexico.  Lagos,  it  is  probable,  will 
be  the  center  of  the  railroad  system  that  shall  go  from  Texas  and 
from  the  capital  to  the  Pacific,  and  also  from  Durango  and  Zacate- 
cas  southward  to  Mexico.  It  should  be  occupied  as  the  center  of 
the  District  of  the  Interior,  with  the  three  great  cities  around  it,  two 
of  them  not  a  day's  ride  off,  as  its  main  centers  of  operation. 

I  submit  this  report  with  an  earnest  entreaty  that  you  will  provide 
by  some  especial  appeal  for  the  indel)tedness  already  incurred,  and 
which  had  to  be  assumed,  or  we  could  have  found  no  foothold  for 
our  beginning;  and  that  you  will  hold  up  the  hands  and  encourage 
the  hearts  of  our  faithful  and  energetic  workers  in  that  field  by  your 
liberality  and  your  prayers,  and  the  men  whom  you  shall  send  for- 
ward to  their  support.  May  God  the  Father.  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost 
bless  and  prosper  our  Church  in  Mexico,  of  his  own  right  hand's 
planting,  increasingly  abundantly  above  what  we  can  ask,  or  give,  or 
even  think,  according  to  the  power  by  which  he  is  able  to  subdue  all 
things  unto  himself  I 

We  give  a  brief  account  of  Bishop  Haven's  visit  to 
the  Liberian  Conference.  He  did  his  work  there  A\  ith 
the  zeai,  patience,  and  carefulness  v/hich  marked  all  his 
conference  work.  We  need  an  African  Bishop  resident 
in  Liberia  to  spare  the  Church  such  terrible  sacrifices  as 


Bishop  Havex.  477 

may  attend  the  further  attempt  to  supply  that  work 
with  regular  episcopal  supervision.  He  should,  how- 
ever, not  be  a  missionary  Bishop  solely,  but  share  equal 
honors,  responsibilities,  and  jurisdiction  with  the  other 
Bishops.  The  election  of  a  resident  Bishop  for  Liberia 
w^ith  restricted  jurisdiction  has  had  and  will  always 
have  the  mischievous  effect  of  withdrawing  that  Con- 
ference from  a  vital  union  with  the  home  Church.  It 
also  deprives  the  local  Bishop  of  that  education 
which  wide  contact  with  affairs  and  free  intercourse 
with  the  episcopal  board  are  well  suited  to  impart. 
Had  such  an  arrangement  existed  in  the  past  Bishop 
Haven  would  perhaps  be  still  alive  and  active.  We 
give  the  following  vivid  pictures  of  his  African  tour 
from  his  own  pen  : 

THE  KRUMAN. 

The  blue-shirted  gentleman,  coming  out  in  his  kmoe  for  a  job,  is 
the  head  Kruman.  He  leaps  up  the  ship's  side,  his  whole  dress  a 
blue  shirt  and  bagged  trousers,  that  come  a  little  below  the  hips. 
He  steps  on  the  deck  and  salutes  the  captain.  We  look  at  him. 
His  face  is  dark,  but  not  disagreeable.  His  form  is  erect,  slim, 
graceful.  Down  the  middle  of  the  forehead  and  the  ridge  of  the 
nose  a  dark  blue  line,  half  an  inch  wide,  descends.  Dark  blue 
marks  are  at  the  outer  end  of  each  eye.  This  is  his  Kru  tattoo,  the 
badge  of  his  tribe,  his  proud  honor.  You  look  at  those  bare  arms 
and  legs  with  a  sculptor's  admiration — slim,  strong  arms  ;  slim, 
strong  legs.  No  lark  or  heel  spur  here,  which  Livingstone  says  the 
West  Coast  negroes  have,  but  the  East  have  not.  His  heel  runs  as 
straight  down  the  heel  and  ankle  as  a  plumb.  It  is  very  neat.  A 
French  boot  would  fit  it  admirably,  only  it  is  handsomer  than  any 
Paris  boot  ever  was. 


4;8  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

the  palm  and  mango. 

Across  the  street  is  a  large  square,  with  palm  and  cocoa-nut  and 
mango  trees.  The  former  two  are  of  the  same  species,  tall  shafts 
tufted  with  long  leaves,  themselves  almost  branches,  the  spine  of 
each  leaf  stretching  out  ten  feet  from  the  naked  trunk,  and  ribbed 
at  every  few  inches  with  long,  slim,  strong  leaves,  each  leaf  balanc- 
ing beautifully  from  its  spinal  column,  like  an  aerial  bow  held  by  one 
end,  springing  up  in  an  arch,  and  sweeping  off  gracefully  and  vitally 
to  its  tapering  close,  that  quivers  in  mid-air  two  or  three  feet  from 
the  leaf's  backbone. 

The  mango  is  a  superb  tree,  not  unlike  the  maple,  but  of  more 
compact  foliage  and  deeper  green.  There  is  an  appearance  of  au- 
tumn in  the  leaf,  quite  a  thickness  of  red  appearing  among  the 
green.  This  is  not  the  sign  of  age,  but  of  youth.  It  is  the  new  leaf 
bursting  the  sheath,  and  looking  like  red  unripe  fruit.  As  it  grows 
riper  it  grows  greener,  until  its  fruition  is  this  deep  mass  of  solid 
color  and  shade.  No  other  tropic  tree  has  such  qualities  of  shade 
as  this.  Get  on  its  right  side  and  the  sun  cannot  smite  you.  It  re- 
sists every  effort.  His  lances  are  thin  and  sharp  and  piercing,  but 
the  mango's  shield  laughs  to  scorn  the  sun's  spear.  It  is  a  splendid 
retreat  from  the  fierce  flame. 

THE  WITCH  HOME. 
A  mile  or  two  further  up  a  big  old  log  projects  into  the  river,  gray 
with  mud  and  years.  It  looks  like  a  gigantic  crocodile,  and  is  no- 
ticed as  the  vegetable  germ  from  which  that  animal  probably  devel- 
oped. Our  friends  tell  us  that  it  has  a  celebrity  greater  than  Dar- 
win could  give  it.  It  is  a  witch-home,  the  first  we  have  seen  of  the 
multitudes  that  cover  thick  with  their  horrors  this  land  of  human 
darkness,  physical  and  spiritual.  That  abode  of  witches  was  a  ter- 
ror to  all  these  boatmen,  and  many  was  the  misery  which  shot 
through  them  as  they  paddled  swiftly  by  the  crocodile-tree.  The 
celebrated  sassawood-tree  is  employed  by  the  natives  for  the  discov- 
ery and  punishment  of  witchcraft. 


Bishop  Haven.  479 

I  asked  our  Kruman,  "  Do  any  sassawood  trees  grow  on  the 
river  ?  " 

"  Plenty,"  he  replied. 
"  Where  ?  " 

"  There  is  one,"  said  he,  pointing  to  a  big  tree  that  hung  well  over 
the  river. 

He  rows  near  it.  It  is  a  huge  tree,  with  a  trunk  that  bends  well 
out  over  the  stream,  and  with  long,  huge  branches.  In  size  and 
general  aspect  the  tree  is  not  unlike  the  wild  cherry.  When  pre- 
pared in  the  usual  way,  by  steeping  its  leaves,  it  produces  a  health- 
ful medicine.  It  is  sold  as  such  at  Sierra  Leone  and  elsewhere.  It 
is  only  when  the  old  rough  bark  is  pounded  and  made  into  a  decoc- 
tion that  it  possesses  the  dangerous  potency  which  makes  it  danger- 
ous as  an  ordeal. 

I  had  some  gathered  at  Bassa.  The  native  who  brought  it  pro- 
nounced it  genuine.  I  told  him  we  would  prove  it  by  having  some 
prepared  and  making  him  drink  it.  He  protested  with  a  cry  o 
alarm  against  such  a  sassawood  ordeal.  Our  boatman  said  he  had 
seen  one  man  take  the  draught. 

"  Where  ?  " 

"  In  we  country."    He  took  it  on  a  charge  of  witchcraft. 
"  Did  he  die  ?  " 

"  If  he  witch,  he  die  ;  if  no  witch,  no  die." 
"  But  which  was  he  ?  " 
"  He  witch,  he  die." 

It  is  the  great  terror  of  the  natives,  the  most  powerful  and  the 
most  terrible  of  their  superstitions.  But  it  is  losing  its  force.  Those 
who  drink  it  do  not  always  die.  Their  friends  sometimes  weaken 
the  dose  or  take  measures  to  give  it  a  favorable  turn. 

A  MODERN  HERO. 

As  we  were  walking  down  to  the  boat  my  conductor  introduced 
me  to  a  native  with  a  large  under  jaw,  and  terrible  teeth  when  he 
laughs,  and  he  laughs  as  much  as  L'honime  qui  rit. 

"  That  man,"  he  says,  "  killed  seven  Frenchmen."    (Or  was  it  six  ? 


48o 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


It  is  so  necessary  to  be  accurate,  or  somebody  will  deny  the  story. 
That  is  the  way  Colenso  proved  Moses  to  be  altogether  a  liar.)  He 
was  taken  as  a  slave  on  a  French  slaver.  Before  it  had  left  the  coast 
he  led  an  insurrection,  murdered  the  officers  and  crew,  held  the  ship 
as  master,  could  not  navigate  her,  and  wns  taken  off  i)y  the  Liberian 
Government,  which  tried  and  acquitted  the  insurrectionists. 

"  How  did  you  feel,"  I  asked,  "  when  killing  the  Frenchmen  ?  " 

"  We  feel  mucli  strong,"  he  answered  ;  and  his  eyes  and  teeth 
shone  terribly.  I  was  glad  he  hadn't  a  knife  then  in  his  hand,  or  he 
might  have  sliown  me  "how  m.uch  strong"  he  still  felt.  The  man 
is  a  hero,  and  justly  so,  of  the  section,  for  has  he  not  killed  seven 
white  men     (or  was  it  six  .'')    Who  has  done  the  like  of  that  ? 

Who  needs  to  be  told  that  in  Liberia  Bishop  Haven 
found  some  things  after  his  own  heart  .'^  Here  was  a 
land  where  for  once  the  negro  has  all  the  rights  that 
any  body  has  elsewhere.  It  was  a  keen  delight  to  this 
lover  of  the  negro  race  to  see  men  of  that  sort  acting  in 
all  the  higher  positions  of  society  with  credit.  He 
found  there  all  that  he  had  so  long  preached  up  and 
hoped  for  in  America.  He  was  introduced  to  all  the 
chief  men  of  the  Republic  of  Liberia.  Many  of  these 
he  sketched  at  length  in  his  newspaper  articles.  Here 
is  a  sample  : 

A  brick  house  receives  us,  two  stories  high,  with  a  deep-shaded 
veranda,  and  large  airy  rooms.  Its  master  was  an  Abolitionist  of 
the  old  school,  had  stood  beside  Garrison  and  his  associates,  had 
fought  with  beasts  at  Ephesus,  that  is,  with  Isaiah  Rynders,  in  New 
York,  in  the  old  Tabernacle  times.  ...  He  came  here  about  twenty 
years  ago,  when  the  battle  of  the  platform  was  at  its  height. 

"  Do  you  know  what  I  came  for  ?  "  be  asked.  "  Because  I  got 
tired  of  being  called  •  Henry.'  I  was  in  the  broker's  board,  and  no 
matter  what  I  bought  and  sold,  no  matter  what  my  dealings  with 


Bishop  Haven. 


my  associates,  I  was  never  called  '  Mr.  Johnson  ;*  it  was  always 
•  Henry.'  I  got  sick  of  such  humiliation,  and  determined  to  come 
to  Liberia.  I  came  up  this  river  within  two  days  after  I  landed  at 
Monrovia.  I  saw  this  point,  and  said, '  I  will  be  owner  of  that  place.' 
It  has  fallen  into  my  hands." 

"Well,  had  you  stayed  in  America,  you  would  not  have  been 
called  '  Henry  '  to-day.  '  Uncle  '  is  gone,  and  'Aunty,'  and  '  Henry  * 
is  fast  following  after,"  was  my  response. 

THE  CONFERENCE. 
Bishop  Haven  had  summoned  the  Liberian  Confer- 
ence to  meet  at  ten  A.  M.  December  i8,  1876.  The 
hour  arrived,  and  the  Bishop  also,  but  no  Conference. 
Weary,  languid,  and  perspiring  sat  the  solitary  officer  in 
the  stifling  church.  Thus  he  learned  that  business  does 
not  properly  begin  in  that  happy  clime  until  the  sea- 
breeze  sets  in.  When  that  came  the  effect  was  marvel- 
ous ;  it  was  a  new  creation.  It  brought  the  members 
in,  and  it  instantly  put  the  Conference  into  a  working 
temper.  This  body  was  last  visited  by  one  of  the  itin- 
erant general  superintendents  about  twenty-five  years 
before  Bishop  Haven's  arrival.  But  the  health  of 
Bishop  Scott,  who  presided  on  that  occasion,  had  been 
so  severely  shaken  by  the  malarious  atmosphere  of  the 
coast,  that  the  General  Conference  took  measures  to 
procure  the  election  of  Rev.  Mr.  Burns  as  missionary 
bishop,  with  a  jurisdiction  restricted  to  the  Liberian 
Conference.  As  Bishop  Haven's  was  the  first  episcopal 
visitation  after  the  death  of  Bishop  Burns,  it  was  an 
occasion  of  especial  interest  to  that  Conference  and  the 

Church  at  home.    There  could  be  no  evening  sessions 
21 


4-82 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


on  account  of  medical  advice  the  Bishop  was  under 
to  return  to  the  vessel  before  sundown,  and  pass  the 
nights  on  board.  Still,  as  the  Conference  consisted  of 
only  a  score  of  ministers,  the  routine  business  could  be 
considered  very  carefully  and  arranged  with  due  delib- 
eration. By  the  members  of  the  body  itself  various 
services  were  held  in  the  evening,  and  the  morning 
prayer-meeting  met  at  six  A.  M.,  so  as  to  adjourn  be- 
fore the  stifling  land  breeze  came  into  operation.  We 
cite  some  incidents  of  the  session  : 

These  brethren  having  enjoyed  for  twenty  years  the  blessing  of  a 
diocesan  episcopacy,  which  some  of  our  American  brothers  seem  so 
anxious  to  try,  have  had  one  luxury  which  attends  that  blessing — 
plenty  of  time  for  every  subject  to  be  more  than  fully  considered. 
The  idea  of  every  elder  being  ready  to  make  his  report  the  first  day 
was  unheard  of;  so,  when  the  districts  were  called,  "Not  ready," 
was  the  response.  The  names  of  the  brethren  were  then  called, 
and  the  missionar}-  collection  was  responded  to  by  but  two  or  three. 
It  was  a  chance  not  to  be  lost.  The  brethren  all  like  preaching, 
and  to  preaching  we  go.  The  difference  between  their  Minutes  in 
these  collections  and  those  of  the  colored  Conferences  in  America 
with  which  by  previous  condition  they  were  especially  affiliated,  was 
noted  in  the  IMinutes,  and  the  duty  and  desirableness  of  conforming 
to  the  order  of  the  Church  were  dwelt  on.  It  was  marvelous  read- 
ing, under  this  African  sun,  the  record  of  South  Carolina,  Mississip- 
pi, Georgia,  Tennessee,  Louisiana,  and  other  Southern  Conferences. 
That  people,  so  poor,  so  prostrate,  so  despised,  so  hated,  a  Nation 
peeled,  shot  down,  burned  down,  driven  into  the  wilderness,  a  prey 
of  every  spoiler,  yet  bringing  up  collections  for  every  Church  cause 
with  a  steadiness  and  liberality  that  put  to  shame  many  a  Northern 
Conference.  Our  brethren  here  have  been  lapped  in  foreign  benev- 
olence so  completely  that  they  are  almost  like  swathed  limbs,  pow- 
erless for  use.    American  prejudice,  called  conscience,  has  lavished 


Bishop  Haven. 


483 


its  abundance  upon  them.  They  have  never  been  required  to  walk 
alone.  The  very  stationery  to  supply  the  secretary  has  been  charged 
to  the  Missionary  Board.  It  was  so  charged  this  year,  as  well  as 
the  canoe  sent  out  to  summon  the  members  to  Conference.  It  did 
not  remain  so.  A  collection  was  raised  to  cover  these  expenses,  and 
self-support  was  thus  inaugurated. 

They  responded  heartily  to  the  new  order,  appointed  committees 
on  Freedmen's  Aid  and  Church  Extension,  and  other  causes  that 
have  risen  and  flourished  since  they  became  an  episcopal  district,  set 
off  practically  from  the  rest  of  the  Church.  Their  reports  on  these 
subjects  were  able,  closing  in  each  case  with  tlie  solid  common-sense 
of  Methodist  preachers  looking  out  for  the  interests  of  their  own 
Conference.  While  thus  cognizant  of  the  new  order  of  things  in  the 
Church  in  America,  they  were  not  negligent  of  the  order  demanded 
for  the  Church  in  Liberia.  Committees  on  education,  on  divorce,  on  the 
extension  of  the  work,  on  temperance,  and  other  such  themes  sprang, 
without  suggestion,  from  the  Conference  itself,  and  it  was  these  topics 
that  created  the  most  enthusiasm  and  the  warmest  discussion. 

Strenuous  enough  were  the  efiforts  of  the  Bishop  to 
secure  not  only  a  conformity  to  the  order  of  the  Ameri- 
can Church  in  its  African  offshoot,  but  also  to  stimulate 
the  holy  flames  of  missionary  zeal  to  greater  ardor.  He 
visited  every  place  it  was  safe  to  visit,  (and,  alas !  some 
that  it  was  not ;)  he  preached  to  as  many  as  he  could 
reach  the  unsearchable  riches  of  Christ ;  looked  at  the 
novel  spectacle  of  heathen  life  with  amazement ;  and  for 
the  first  time,  saw  how  fatal  an  obstruction  to  Christian- 
izing the  natives  is  the  fury  of  the  local  wars. 

Bishop  Haven  was  not  very  well  pleased  to  find  that  the 
cost  of  traveling  from  point  to  point,  and  the  slightness 
of  the  work  at  many  places,  had  practically  turned  the 
presiding  elders  into  stationed  preachers,  the  stationed 


484 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


preachers  into  settled  pastors,  and  so  revolutionized  the 
poUty  of  the  Church.  He  found  the  results  of  this 
change  harmful. 

The  Church  in  America  treats  Liberia  as  a  purely  mission  field. 
She  supplies  her  with  every  thing  from  parsonage  to  preacher.  She 
expects  from  her  nothing.  She  has  not  dealt  so  with  any  other 
Conference,  except  those  in  purely  mission  fields.  .  .  .  But  let  us 
not  think  of  ourselves  more  unworthily  than  we  ought  to  think.  We 
are  like  all  the  rest  of  the  Churches  here.  Every  Presbyterian  pas- 
tor and  teacher  is  supported  from  abroad.  So  is  every  Episcopalian 
pastor.  So  every  Baptist  has  been.  It  is  said  that  they  are  now 
being  thrown  off  by  the  American  Baptists,  and  their  churches, 
among  the  best  I  have  seen,  suggest  this  fact  as  the  cause  of  their 
superior  appearance. 

MISSIONARY  GRAVES. 

As  we  rowed  ashore  in  the  dawning  of  the  last  Sabbath  in  January, 
the  fog  lay  so  heavy  on  the  land  that  the  latter  was  not  visible  until 
you  were  directly  beneath  it.  This  fog  is  not  a  mere  oceanic  mist, 
or  one  from  the  rivers  near  by,  but  it  is  the  malarious  exhalation 
from  the  mangrove  swamps  that  so  widely  engirt  the  city.  It  is  the 
city's  chief  ailment.  Could  it  be  reduced  or  removed  the  city  would 
be  greatly  relieved.  .  .  .  We  enter  the  wide  avenue,  with  its  soft 
carpet  of  green.  Every  thing  is  thick  embowered  with  life.  What 
intense  life  !  Roses,  large,  full,  and  of  exquisite  tint,  poured  forth 
their  fragrance,  more  exquisite  than  their  color.  The  verbena 
clothed  the  wall  corners  with  its  profuse  vines  and  blossoms,  a  pink 
and  green  bower  of  beauty  and  odor.  The  deep  green  of  the  paw- 
paw, the  tall  shafts  and  lances  of  the  palm,  the  dense  wide-spread-- 
ing  foliage  of  the  mango,  the  immense  leaves  of  the  plantain,  how 
can  this  intense,  this  unspeakable  fullness  of  life  lead  but  to  the 
grave  ?  It  is  impossible  that  life  in  nature  should  be  so  profound 
and  so  permanent,  and  in  man  so  feeble  and  evanescent.  .  .  . 

We  enter  the  holy  inclosure.    These  graves  were  cleansed  of  their 


Bishop  Haven. 


485 


annual  growth  of  ferns  and  bushes  less  than  a  month  ago,  and 
already  ferns  and  palms  are  springing  up,  and  have  grown  a  foot  or 
more  in  height.  The  three  central  graves  of  the  group  are  those  we 
chiefly  regarded.  They  lie  rounded  and  neat  and  well  cared  for. 
Ferns  of  delicate  leaf  and  color  were  growing  out  of  the  white  soil. 
Here  are  the  graves  of  Mellville  B.  Cox,  and  Samuel  Osgood 
Wright  and  his  wife.  This  is  the  center  of  our  missionary  graves  ; 
this  the  beginning  of  the  Church's  martyrdom  for  the  world's  redemp- 
tion; this  the  first  response  to  the  cry  of  the  perishing  people; 
this  the  first  bugle-note  whose  echoes  have  rung  ceaselessly  through 
the  ear  of  the  Church,  and  shall  ring  till  the  Church,  through 
Christ,  has  redeemed  the  world.  .  .  . 

Time  hastened.  The  officer  only  allowed  us  an  hour,  our  guide 
was  more  anxious  than  I,  and  items  of  Church  business  still  awaited 
attention.  We  must  leave  the  holy  spot  and  its  holier  occupants. 
A  few  rods  beyond,  the  great  deep  sent  up  its  ceaseless  roar  and 
spray.  Yet  so  dense  was  the  fog,  even  at  this  hour  after  sunrise, 
that  we  could  not  see  the  spray.  It  was  close  by  and  visible,  could 
the  malarial  cloud  but  lift  a  thousand  feet.  But  it  would  not.  My 
friend  forbade  my  going  thither,  mindful  of  the  lapse  of  time,  and  also 
mindful  of  my  unacclimated  state.    So  I  leave  the  shore  unvisited. 

One,  at  least,  of  Bishop  Haven's  friends  read  such  pas- 
sages as  this  from  the  African  letters  with  forebodings  of 
sad  consequences,  and  to  his  troubled  mind  Dante's  words 
kept  recurring,  though  with  a  sense  Dante  never  gave 
them  : 

"  Lo  giorno  sen'  andava,  e  I'aer  bruno, 
Toglieva  gli  anamai,  che  sono  in  terra, 
Dalle  fatiche  loro."  * — Inferno ^  Canto  2,  lines  1-3. 


*  These  lines  suffer  somewhat  in  the  deft  hands  of  Mr.  Longfellow: 

"  Day  was  departing,  and  the  embrowned  air 
Released  the  animals  that  are  on  earth 
From  their  fatigues." 


486  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

FAILING  HEALTH. 

Health— Perilous  Daring— Perfect  Health  on  the  Coast — The  Ice  Bolt— General  Con- 
dition—Resting—Clifton Rest— The  End  Near— Pacific  Coast  Trip — Last  Conference — 
The  Three  Warnings— His  Last  Meeting  with  the  Bishops— Home— Last  Services— Sud- 
den Illness— Public  Sorrow  and  Prayer— Rapid  Decline — Playfulness— The  Vain  Struggle 
— Reception  Day — The  Departure. 

ILBERT  HAVEN  was  a  man  of  such  vast  and  in- 
tense  vitality  that  there  seemed  to  be  something  con- 
tradictory and  absurd  in  the  bare  notion  of  his  being  sick. 
People  who  only  saw  him  here  and  there  on  his  episcopal 
tours,  or  unbending  during  the  rare  intervals  of  repose 
he  allowed  himself,  could  not  fail  to  be  impressed  with 
his  immense  vital  energy.  He  was  not  only  unsparing 
of  himself  in  work,  but  he  carried  such  a  nervous  vigor 
into  all  his  recreations,  that  he  could  hardly  expect  to 
be  thought  of  as  one  whose  life  was  not  at  its  flood. 

Those  who  knew  him  in  middle  life  were  aware  that 
he  never  wholly  recovered  from  the  consequences  of 
that  long  and  searching  illness  which  preceded  his  elec- 
tion to  the  editorship  of  **Zion's  Herald."  His  familiar 
friends  knew  that  his  health  was  somewhat  seriously 
broken  for  a  long  time  after  that  event.  Though  still 
very  energetic  and  full  of  all  sorts  of  work  with  voice 
and  pen,  he  had  seasons  of  deep  nervous  depression. 
Several  times  during  those  days  was  he  forced  by  sud- 
den and  alarming  seizures  to  leave  a  merry  company, 


Failing  Health. 


487 


and  rest  for  some  hours.  He  was  never  very  careful  in 
his  habits,  and  found  the  demand  to  put  any  check  on 
himself  a  serious  burden.  The  cares,  labors,  and  travels 
imposed  upon  him  in  his  episcopal  office  did  not  aid 
him  to  regular  habits  or  restful  nights.  His  incessant 
preaching,  lecturing,  address  making,  and  public  and 
private  correspondence  grew  to  be  a  burden  no  giant 
could  bear. 

When  Bishop  Haven  was  appointed  by  his  colleagues 
to  visit  the  Liberia  Conference,  in  1876,  the  announce- 
ment was  to  many  who  knew  his  real  bodily  condition 
and  his  proneness  to  take  needless  risks,  very  much  like 
reading  his  death  warrant.  Though  he  would  say  but 
little  about  it,  he  would  have  in  his  vivid  imagination 
such  a  clear  vision  of  the  perils  to  be  encountered  there 
that  he  would  suffer  greatly  in  anticipation.  Then  he 
would  accuse  himself  of  cowardice,  and  strive  to  trample 
down  all  needless  fears.  Then  he  would  run  too  great 
risk  in  some  critical  moment  where  one  wrong  decision 
would  slowly  but  surely  turn  the  fatal  scale.  He  him- 
self has  shown  the  play  of  this  temper  in  his  letters  from 
Africa : 

Come  back  to  Cape  Palmas.  Scene — an  open,  airy  room  on  the 
point  of  the  cape,  overlooking  the  sea  on  three  sides.  Time — seven 
o'clock  in  the  morning-.  Persons — your  correspondent,  an  Episcopal 
missionary  and  his  wife.  Topic — my  intended  visit  to  the  interior, 
to  the  end  of  my  parish.  .  .  .  Suffice  it  to  say  the  trip  was  condemned. 
It  was  too  hot.  It  is  too  late  in  the  day.  You  will  get  the  fever,  I 
should  not  deem  it  safe  to  go  myself.  You  should  have  gone  early 
in  the  morning,  if  at  all.  Our  native  minister,  Rev.  Charles  Cum- 
mings,  enters. 


488 


Life  of  Giluert  Haven. 


"  I  don't  think  you  had  better  go  to  Tubmantown,"  he  says. 
"  Too  hot,  you  get  fever." 
"  But  appointment  is  made." 
*'  No  matter.    Must  not  get  sick." 

Others  thought  he  might  go.  And  he,  alas  for  him  ! 
says  that  Free-will  reasons  thus :  '  Announcement 
made,  congregation  gathering,  some  have  walked  from 
the  town,  team  ready,  risks  not  great.  Go  ! '  "  And 
go  he  did.  Nor  was  this  a  single  venture  into  this  nest 
of  deadly  peril.  More  than  once  all  his  companions  in 
travel  as  well  as  his  African  advisers  refused  to  go  with 
him  on  these  dangerous  expeditions.  Then  only  did  he 
reluctantly  yield.  He  reports  of  his  condition  there : 
"  I  never  experienced  any  sickness  of  any  sort.  I  was 
as  well  when  I  left  Sierra  Leone  as  when  I  reached 
Monrovia."  His'  courage  grew,  and  he  said  the  danger 
from  fever  had  been  exaggerated.  But  near  Teneriffe  a 
change  befell  him  in  the  night : 

A  pillar  of  ice  had  erected  itself  inside  my  spine.  ...  It  must  be 
stopped,  or  it  will  be  sheathed  in  ice,  and  then  in  fire,  until  the  two- 
fold process  of  congealing  and  cremating  reduces  the  castle  and 
expels  the  soul.  I  rise,  hunt  for  the  pain-killer,  get  a  stiff  dose,  and 
such  extra  clothes  as  are  in  the  room,  and  get  back  into  the  cot.  A 
violent  perspiration  breaks  forth,  but  the  ice  column  does  not  vanish 
away.  I  am  not  unlike  a  lump  of  ice  in  the  summer  sun,  wet  with 
its  own  perspiration  without,  as  cold  as  the  North  Pole  within.  My 
only  duty  is  to  keep  the  ice  bolt  from  taking  possession  of  the  whole 
body.  This  I  cannot  do  by  any  power  save  that  of  the  will.  Will 
that  do  it }  I  can  try.  ...  It  is  day  break  ;  the  ice  shaft  has  not 
increased  nor  diminished.  I  cry  aloud  and  spare  not.  My  com- 
panions, after  due  scream' ngs,  came  over  the  way.    More  stuff  is 


Failing  Health. 


489 


poured  down  and  piled  on,  and  in  half  an  hour  the  ice-bolt  is  dis- 
solved. 1  rise  and  take  breakfast,  and  am  off  with  companions  and 
the  consul  for  a  three-days'  trip  to  the  peak  of  Teneriffe,  as  uncon- 
scious of  chill  as  if  the  ghost  had  not  stood  up  inside  my  frame,  a 
skeleton  of  death  in  the  living  skeleton,  all  that  long  and  horribly 
frightful  night. 

What  was  it  ?  The  fever  ?  No  change  of  pulse.  A  scare  ? 
Never  a  child  fell  asleep  more  sweetly.  No  dreams  before  it  came, 
nor  nightmare,  or  other  horse  of  any  revelator  sort  had  been  its 
avant-coiireur.  It  was  a  reality,  whatever  else  it  was.  That  is  what 
I  know,  and  all  I  know,  of  the  beginning  of  the  "  malaria." 

At  first  he  was  quite  reluctant  to  think  that  so  terri- 
ble a  disease  had  really  fastened  upon  him.  He  went 
about  his  usual  official  work  with  much  of  his  old  fire. 
He  held  Conferences,  visited  schools,  went  to  college 
commencements,  lectured,  and  preached.  He  did  some 
of  his  best  literary  work  after  the  malarial  fever  began 
to  burn  within  him.  The  ablest  physicians  whom  he 
consulted  warned  him  of  the  gravity  of  his  danger,  but 
thought  he  might  be  cured  by  protracted  and  vigorous 
treatment.  But,  as  they  enjoined  cessation  of  work  and 
diligent  idleness,  he  thought  he  could  not  put  himself 
into  their  hands.  Then  he  did  not  think  himself  in  so 
perilous  a  condition  as  he  was  for  a  long  time.  He 
visited  Ocean  Grove,  Martha's  Vineyard,  Old  Orchard 
Beach,  and  many  hospitable  homes,  where  he  was  as 
welcome  as  at  his  mother's  abode.  But  all  such  efforts 
were  of  so  little  avail  that  he  describes  his  usual  con- 
dition in  this  way  : 

The  first  night  on  an  American  shore  this  chilliness,  in  a  subdued 
form,  took  possession  of  my  flesh  generally.    A  low,  murmurous 


490 


Ltfk  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


shiver  ;  hardly  a  chill,  only  a  child  of  a  chill.  That  never  left. 
Sometimes  it  felt  like  a  cool  breeze  on  a  hot  day,  blowing  through 
the  center  of  the  bones.  Sydney  Smith's  wish  was  realized  without 
taking  off  the  flesh.  I  could  sit  in  my  bones  with  the  cool  east  wind 
blowing  steadily  through  them,  as  one  feels  such  a  breeze  on  the 
coast  on  a  hot  day. 

It  need  not  be  said  that  such  a  strong  and  resolute 
man  did  not  yield  until  forced  to.  He  even  tried  rest, 
so  far  as  his  restless  nature  could.  But  the  effort  it  cost 
him  showed  at  how  high  a  pressure  was  his  ordinary  life  : 

How  one  gets  to  liking  what  he  once  hated  !  Of  this  sort  was 
Clifton  Rest.  Forced  to  it  a  year  ago,  I  joyfully  fled  to  it  a  month 
ago.  It  was  delightful  even  to  draw  near  it.  The  quiet  that  pos- 
sesses it  is  not  stagnation,  but  life.  The  soft  paper  hall-carpet, 
which  is  the  best  of  matting,  giving  forth  neither  sound  nor  dust,  is 
trodden  quietly.  The  same  still  smile  on  the  attendants,  from  the 
chief  to  the  bath-man,  greets  you.    Every  thing  stimulates  to  repose. 

Your  system  yields  readily  to  the.  influence,  and  you  sink  into  lux- 
urious arms,  strong  and  quiet.  ... 

Here  you  sleep  and  walk  and  eat  and  bathe,  and  even  sing  under 
the  blessed  atmosphere  of  repose.  The  very  Scriptures  that  dwell 
on  this  thought  have  here  a  new  significance.  He  giveth  his  be- 
loved sleep."  "  There  remaineth  therefore  a  rest  for  the  people  of 
God."  "  Come  unto  me,  all  ye  that  are  weary  and  heavy  laden,  and 
I  will  give  you  rest."  "Ye  shall  find  rest  to  your  souls."  Such 
sentences  seem  to  be  read  at  the  right  place  when  read  at  Clifton. 

He  took  with  him  on  his  journeys  the  growing  con- 
viction that  he  was  nearing  his  heavenly  rest.  Perhaps 
it  was  this  feeling  which  led  him  henceforth  to  take  his 
son  and  daughter  with  him  whenever  he  could.  It 
seems  as  though  such  a  thought  must  have  inspired 
him  to  take  them  both  with  him  the  last  summer  he 


Failing  Health.  491 

lived,  on  his  trip  to  Oregon  and  California.  Before  he 
started  on  this  tour  an  eminent  physician,  whom  he 
consulted  at  Cincinnati,  had  informed  him  that  his  hip 
trouble  was,  perhaps,  a  fungus  growth  on  the  bone, 
which  would  have  to  be  cut  out,  and  that  the  operation 
even  then  might  fail.  Another  doctor  told  him  it  might 
be  scrofula.    He  comments  : 

It  is  quite  swollen,  and  at  times  very  painful.  It  may  be  my  last 
stroke.  I  have  had  three  warnings — in  my  head  in  '65,  my  back  at 
the  Canaries,  and  all  over  me  at  Xenia.  Is  this  the  end  ?  God 
knows.  How  beautiful  the  thought.  He  knows  ;  blessed  be  his 
name !  I  love  his  name  and  cause  and  work.  I  hope  I  shall  love 
him  more  in  heaven. 

Foreseeing  a  speedy  end  of  his  earthly  companion- 
ships. Bishop  Haven  perhaps  quietly  planned  that  long, 
happy,  and  interesting  tour  of  three  months  as  an  eter- 
nal fountain  of  joy  and  consolation  for  the  dear  children 
after  his  departure.  It  was  like  him  to  do  that  without 
saddening  them  with  any  fruitless  forebodings  of  inevit- 
able sorrow. 

When  they  parted  from  him  at  Chicago  he  wrote  of 
them  : 

We  celebrated  the  wedding-day  by  a  ride  on  the  Alameda  of  San 
Jose,  we  three  alone.  We  haven't  been  together  on  that  day  before 
for  years.    How  and  where  did  the  other  three  spend  it  ? 

Dr.  Hatfield  induced  him  to  consult  a  certain  Dr. 
Davis  in  Chicago.  Then  he  got  another  warning  from 
him  in  a  statement  that  the  trouble  was  a 

Fungus  formation  on  the  bone,  not  of  malignant  type,  which  might 
become  troublesome,  and  might  require  amputation — not  without 


492 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


danger.  It  began  to  be  noticer]  on  the  African  coast.  It  is  part  of 
that  trip,  perhaps  the  fatal  arrow.  I  asked  the  Lord  to  remove  it, 
or,  if  he  purposed  otherwise,  to  give  me  grace  to  submit.  I  felt  I 
should  die  that  year,  my  fifty-sixth.  It  may  be  that  the  death-stroke 
came  that  year.  It  came  many  a  year  before  that  to  the  soul,  almost 
twenty  years. 

With  these  facts  and  fears  weighing  on  his  mind  and 
heart,  Bishop  Haven  went  to  the  last  of  his  Annual  Con- 
ferences, the  Central  Illinois,  at  Monmouth.  He  went 
through  his  episcopal  duties  with  his  ordinary  success 
and  serenity.  He  preached  his  last  Conference  sermon 
there  on  Jude  3:  "Beloved,  when  I  gave  all  diligence 
to  write  unto  you  of  the  common  salvation,  it  was  need- 
ful for  me  to  write  unto  you,  and  exhort  you  that  you 
should  earnestly  contend  for  the  faith  which  was  once 
delivered  unto  the  saints."  At  their  missionary  anni- 
versar)^  he  also  made  a  speech.  His  last  entry  in  the 
Journal,  under  date  of  October  T2,  at  Monmouth,  says, 
"  Expect  to  leave  here  ^Monday  or  Tuesday  for  At- 
lanta." 

He  was  present  at  the  meetings  of  the  Missionary 
Board  and  of  the  Board  of  Bishops  at  New  York  in 
November.  He  took  great  interest  in  the  plans  for 
widening  the  range  of  the  work  of  the  Missionary  So- 
ciety. He  held  that  the  Church  would  respond  warmly 
to  a  bold  and  spirited  administration.  He  was  sure  to 
help  on  by  voice  and  vote  all  measures  in  these  direc- 
tions. The  provisions  made  for  the  Bulgarian  work 
and  for  a  tour  of  observation  in  Alaska  as  missionary 
ground  were  hailed  by  him  with  delight.    He  had  here, 


Failing  Health.  493 

as  always,  the  statesman's  prevision  of  coming  necessi- 
ties, and  an  apostolic  zeal  in  meeting  them. 

Though  his  colleagues  in  the  episcopate  had  the 
gravest  doubts  about  his  ability  to  perform  his  custom- 
ary share  of  their  great  work  of  supervision,  they  as- 
signed him  the  usual  proportion  of  Conferences.  He  had 
sometimes  shown  a  little  annoyance  when  some  of  the 
other  Bishops  had,  in  obedience  to  private  communi- 
cations from  members  of  his  Conferences,  who  were 
alarmed  at  his  condition,  happened  to  visit  his  Confer- 
ences. Once  he  said  at  such  a  time  :  "  Two  Bishops 
are  not  needed  to  run  a  Conference.  I  have  a  mind  to 
take  the  cars  and  leave."  It  is  stated  also  that  he 
quieted  some,  who  desired  an  easier  arrangement  for 
him,  by  saying,  Let  me  work  while  I  can.  Probably 
you  will  be  doing  your  work  when  I  am  in  my  grave." 
He  had  arranged  to  pay  the  writer  a  visit  at  Middletown 
on  his  way  from  New  York  to  Maiden  ;  but  he  sent  a 
postal  a  few  days  later  saying  that  he  could  not  endure 
the  extra  fatigue  the  visit  would  involve.  In  such  weak- 
ness of  the  flesh  were  these  closing  days  spent,  that  a 
gentleman  in  New  York  noticed  him  laboring  along  the 
street  pursuing  a  horse-car,  in  such  visible  physical  dis- 
tress, that  he  took  the  Bishop's  bag,  gave  him  an  arm, 
helped  him  into  the  car,  and  got  for  a  reward  a  warm 

Thank  you  ;  that  was  a  Christian  deed."  The  gentle- 
man did  not  know  whom  he  was  helping  until  he  heard 
the  voice,  when  he  recognized  the  Bishop.  At  the  final 
audit  let  us  hope  that  this  kindness  may  count  for  a  cup 
of  cold  water." 


494  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

On  November  i8  he  reached  the  dear  old  home  at 
Maiden,  very  much  worn  out  from  his  extended  journey 
and  from  the  duties  and  excitements  of  the  meetings  at 
New  York.  But  the  next  morning  he  called  on  the 
Rev.  S.  F.  Upham,  D.D.,  in  Boston,  infinitely  tired," 
but  bent  on  going  that  day  to  Salem  to  attend  the  fu- 
neral of  the  Rev.  Gershom  F.  Cox,  a  saintly  spirit,  a 
great  sufferer,  and  a  man  greatly  prized  by  Gilbert 
Haven.  The  services  were  long,  his  own  part  in  them 
trying,  and  he  must  have  become  nearly  worn  out  be- 
fore they  were  done.  In  his  prayer  at  this  funeral  lov- 
ing ears  heard  an  allusion  to  his  own  condition  when  he 
said  with  great  tenderness  :  "  The  feet  of  them  that  will 
carry  us  out  are  at  the  door."  Yet  he  was  the  life  of  a 
small  company  of  ministers  waiting  in  the  Lynn  station 
for  the  train.  Said  Rev.  O.  A.  Brown  :  I  never  saw 
the  Bishop  in  such  elastic  spirits,  and  so  brilliant  in  con- 
versation as  he  was  on  that  stormy  day  and  that  gloomy 
occasion,  dying  though  he  was  of  fatigue  and  disease." 

On  Thursday  evening  he  lectured  at  the  People's 
Church,  in  Boston,  a  heroic  enterprise,  in  whose  success 
and  great  usefulness  he  had  always  expressed  great  con- 
fidence, to  which  he  gave  generous  gifts  of  service  and 
money,  and  which  he  urged  others  to  assist.  This  was 
a  fitting  close  of  his  public  work.  It  w^as  done  for  a 
warm  friend.  Rev.  J.  W.  Hamilton,  one  of  the  young 
men  whom  he  held  very  dear ;  a  gratuitous  service  done 
for  the  advancement  of  Christ's  kingdom  in  Boston. 

On  Sunday,  November  23,  he  was  present  in  the 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church  at  Maiden,  at  the  public 


Failing  Health.  495 

worship  of  Almighty  God  for  the  last  time  in  the  body. 
With  that  congregation  he  had  first  begun  to  join  in 
that  worship  ;  where  else  could  he  so  fitly  pay  his  last 
visit  to  the  sanctuary  ?  Before  the  service  ended  he  was 
suddenly  taken  with  sharp  pain  in  his  hands,  which  shot  up 
his  arms  like  fire,  and  flamed  through  the  entire  frame. 
He  went  out  of  the  church  to  his  mother's  abode  near 
by,  and  entered  the  sacred  home  for  the  last  time. 
Some  saw  a  signal  goodness  of  God  to  Gilbert  Haven 
and  the  dear  home  circle,  that  this  man  had  come  away 
from  the  perils  of  the  disturbed  South,  and  from  the 
sorest  dangers  of  Mexico,  the  stormy  ocean,  and  pesti- 
lential Africa  to  meet  the  last  sickness  in  his  mother's 
home,  where  his  mother's  eyes  could  beam  upon  him, 
where  sisterly  affection  could  spend  itself  in  loving  min- 
istrations around  his  bed,  where  his  beloved  William 
Ingraham  Haven  and  Mary  Michelle  Haven  might  seek 
to  perform  the  impossible  for  him  by  loving  attention 
and  restless  prayer.  If  Gilbert  Haven  thought  of  this 
at  all,  it  was  with  profound  gratitude,  gratitude  beyond 
words  or  tears,  that  a  loving  God  had  brought  him 
where  he  might  be  laid  to  sleep  with  his  beloved  Mary, 
where  they  could  make  bonny  dust  together  "  until, 
the  resurrection  morning. 

The  tidings  went  rapidly  over  the  whole  land  that  this 
greatly  beloved  "  man  was  so  seriously  unwell  as  to  im- 
peril his  life.  If  prayer  could  have  saved  him  there  would 
have  been  no  need  of  physicians,  for  prayer  was  made 
without  ceasing  of  the  Church  unto  God  for  him."  He 
said  in  his  last  days,  "  I  have  lived  in  the  Church  and 


49^  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

for  the  Church.  O  how  I  have  loved  the  Church  ! " 
The  Church  now  prayed  with  such  an  ardor  for  this 
great  son  and  noble  servant  of  hers  as  she  rarely  prays 
with  for  any  person,  as  she  would  have  prayed  for  Lin- 
coln had  time  permitted,  and  as  she  did  pray  for  stricken 
Garfield.  Many  of  the  saints  of  God  must  have  framed 
their  petitions  after  the  manner  of  the  sisters  at  Bethany, 
Lord,  behold,  he  whom  thou  lovest  is  sick."  The  sick 
man  joined  in  this  common  supplication  of  the  saints 
with  ardor  and  hope.  There  was  so  much  to  live  for. 
His  venerable  mother,  his  fond  sisters,  his  dear  children, 
the  beloved  Church,  the  negroes,  the  nation,  the  world. 
His  endowments  for  the  episcopal  office  were  showing 
themselves  more  and  more  complete.  He  was  not  un- 
conscious that  his  position  and  influence  were  in  many 
respects  unique,  and  that  his  service  was  greatly  needed. 
But  he  had  long  been  feeling  that  God  might  appoint 
otherwise.  A  year  before  he  went  to  Liberia,  when  he 
had  no  thought  of  going,  he  said  in  his  Journal,  I  felt 
I  ought  to  stay  until  the  children  had  grown  up.  Mary 
would  rebuke  me  if  I  came  before.  They  are  grown. 
Perhaps  I  can  be  excused."  When  his  son  was  grad- 
uated at  Middletown  he  said  to  a  friend,  "  My  children 
no  longer  need  me.  They  can  take  care  of  themselves 
just  as  well  as  I  could  at  their  age.  Perhaps  the  end  is 
near." 

At  this  critical  time  he  waited  on  the  Lord,  ready  to 
stay  and  work,  enjoy  the  society  of  his  family  and 
friends,  or  ready  to  be  called  home.  When  he  was  told 
what  ardent  prayer  was  going  up  to  God  for  him,  and 


Failing  Health.  497 

saw  how  fervidly  it  flamed  out  in  the  home  circle,  he 
reminded  them  that  God  sometimes  gives  a  denial  as 
the  best  response  to  our  petitions.  He  showed  his  own 
feeling  by  placing  his  finger  at  the  top  of  a  picture  of 
the  Bishops  in  the  parlor.  "  Bishop  Janes  is  gone,"  said 
he ;  then  running  it  down  to  the  center,  "  Bishop  Ames 
is  gone,"  he  said  ;  then  running  it  down  to  the  bottom, 
he  added,  "The  death-stroke  is  descending;  whose  turn 
will  it  be  next      Bishop  Peck's  or  mine  ?" 

Meanwhile  the  physicians  were  doing  what  they  could 
to  overcome  his  maladies.  But  a  little  time  to  study  their 
characteristics  must  have  sufficed  to  show  that  they  had 
no  reasonable  hope  for  success.  With  a  taint  of  scrofu- 
la, there  was  African  malaria,  the  osteal  fungus,  Bright's 
disease,  and,  toward  the  close,  dropsy  and  heart  dis- 
ease. It  became  only  too  evident,  even  to  the  reluctant 
eyes  of  love,  that  the  end  was  near.  He  was  gentle  and 
kind  as  ever,  thoughtful  for  all  around  him,  and  thank- 
ful for  all  that  was  done  for  him.  But  he  was  not  the 
easiest  patient  to  deal  with.  His  head  was  too  full  of 
thoughts  and  schemes  and  his  heart  too  full  of  emotion. 
He  hungered  after  the  news  of  the  day,  and  it  was  not 
possible  with  the  utmost  diligence  to  keep  it  from  him. 
The  political  confusion  in  Maine  was  filling  the  papers 
just  then,  and  General  Grant  was  in  the  South.  His 
interest  in  these  subjects  was  intense,  and  he  saw  that 
the  news  was  doled  out  to  him  rather  scantily.  He  put 
so  many  questions  that  they  had  to  tell  him  something 
in  response.  What  they  told  provoked  comments  and 
discussions,  and  made  him  hungry  for  more.    He  would 


498  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

persist  in  getting  news  from  any  quarter,  and  enjoyed 
his  triumph  when  he  succeeded.  A  new  nurse  came 
one  day  from  Boston,  for  all  the  attendants  were 
greatly  worn  down  with  constant  watching  and  rub- 
bing and  lifting.  At  first  he  did  not  appear  to  feel 
much  interest  in  the  new  nurse  ;  but  after  they  had 
been  left  alone  for  the  night,  he  suddenly  brightened 
up,  and  began  to  ply  him  with  questions : 
*'  What  is  your  name  ?  " 
Griggs." 

"  Do  you  take  any  interest  in  politics?" 
"  Some  ;  I  have  been  a  member  of  the  Massachusetts 
Legislature." 

"  Have  you  ?  Then  you'll  know.  Who  is  the  chair- 
man of  the  National  Republican  Committee?" 

"  Don  Cameron." 
Thank  God  !  "   responded  the  dying  man.  The 
family  had  not  taken  the  precaution  to  warn  the  nurse 
against  such  conversation,  and  the  patient  made  good 
use  of  so  rare  an  opportunity. 

Bishop  Haven  had  all  his  old  playfulness  during  his 
last  sickness.  One  day  there  ^had  been  too  much  con- 
versation carried  on  with  those  around  him,  so  that  he 
grew  greatly  fatigued.  Foreseeing  remonstrances,  he 
neatly  flanked  them  by  saying, 

"  I  think  we  have  had  quite  too  much  talking  here  to- 
day.   Don't  you  think  so  ?  " 

"  Yes,"  said  they. 
Well,  then,  we  will  have  less  to-morrow.'* 

One  day  his  sister,  Hannah,  said, 


Failing  Health.  499 

Well,  Gilbert,  we  shall  not  be  separated  long." 

Shaking  his  finger  at  her  in  a  threatening  way,  he  said, 
Now,  Hannah,  don't  you  dare  to  come  to  heaven 
before  mother  does  !  " 

How  involuntarily  does  this  remind  us  of  the  Saviour 
on  the  cross  commending  his  mother  to  the  care  of  his 
beloved  John. 

One  day  his  venerable  mother  had  been  lamenting 
over  the  prospect  of  losing  him,  and  so  burying  the  last 
of  her  boys.  He  turned  the  silver  lining  of  that  cloud 
full  upon  her  vision  with  the  sudden  response,  "  I  tell 
you  what,  mother,  your  boys  will  give  you  a  royal  wel- 
come into  heaven  ! " 

In  spite  of  every  thing  that  skill  and  love  could  do 
the  patient  grew  steadily  worse.  On  Friday,  January  2, 
after  quite  a  respite  from  severe  suffering,  he  had  a 
sharp  turn  of  distress  for  breath,  and  begged  Dr.  Saw- 
telle,  the  attending  physician,  to  remain  with  him  until 
he  was  better.  About  midnight  he  aroused  from  a 
broken  slumber,  so  much  better,  that  he  said,  Thank 
God,  the  storm  is  over !  Doctor,  you  can  go  home  now. 
My  good  brother  (looking  at  his  nurse)  and  I  will  fight 
it  out  on  this  line  to-night." 

When  the  physician  had  gone.  Bishop  Haven  turned 
to  his  attendant,  saying,  "  Now,  Brother  Griggs,  tell  me 
all  about  Grant's  movements  to-day.  Will  he  get 
through  the  South  safe?  Thank  God  that  he  will  not 
permit  a  reception  where  the  black  man  is  ignored." 

When  these  demands  had  been  satisfied,  he  asked  con- 
cerning the  political  situation  in  Maine. 


500  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

"  But,  Bishop,  you  know  we  agreed  not  to  talk  any 
more  about  Maine  politics." 

The  dying  man  responded  eagerly,  I  must  know  to- 
night all  there  is  to  be  known  about  it.  The  will  of  the 
people  must  not  be  thwarted." 

He  immediately  dropped  the  subject,  however,  when 
informed  that  the  dispute  had  been  referred  for  decis- 
ion to  the  Supreme  Court. 

About  five  o'clock  in  the  morning  of  his  last  day  on 
earth,  the  patient  turned  suddenly  to  his  faithful  nurse 
asking,  "  Do  you  think  I  am  dying?" 

When  the  latter  replied,  No,  Bishop,  but  I  think 
this  the  beginning  of  the  end,"  he  demanded, 

"  Do  you  think  the  physicians  have  giv^en  up  all 
hope  ?  " 

To  the  reply,  I  fear  they  have,"  he  responded  with 
a  little  surprise, 

"  Is  that  so?  What  had  I  better  do?  For  the  sake 
of  the  Church  I  do  not  wish  to  die  until  every  means  is 
exhausted.  Call  my  sister  and  my  son.  Let  us  have  a 
little  consultation,  we  four." 

In  that  hurried  consultation  three  doctors  were  men- 
tioned who  had  rendered  him  acceptable  aid  under  other 
attacks.  "  Then  we  shall  have  three  horns  to  our 
dilemma,"  said  the  sufferer.  It  was  stated  that  one  of 
the  physicians  had  been  a  professor  of  obstetrics  at  the 
Harvard  Medical  College,  and  the  statement  touched  his 
quick  sense  of  the  ridiculous  into  i'^s  final  explosion.  "  I 
am  not  in  his  line,  am  I  ?  "  It  was  remarked  that  one 
could  not  possibly  come.       That  It  aves  us  two,"  was 


Failing  Health. 


501 


the  quiet  comment.  It  was  further  decided  that  another 
resided  too  far  away  to  be  depended  on.  "  That  leaves 
us  one."  To  the  last  a  messenger  was  sent,  not  with 
any  real  hope,  but  in  order  that  nothing  might  be  left 
undone. 

On  Saturday  morning,  January  3,  Dr.  Sawtelle  observed 
that  a  striking  change  in  the  patient's  condition  had  hap- 
pened during  the  night.  He  was  convinced  that  Bishop 
Haven  could  not  outlive  the  day.  The  Bishop  himself 
announced  the  crisis  to  the  sorrowful  family,  saying  in 
his  characteristic  style :  "  There,  it  is  just  as  I  told  you. 
I  am  like  the  old  deacon's  one-hoss  shay,  all  broken 
down  at  once."  He  at  once  had  messages  sent  off  to 
his  old  and  dear  friends  to  come  and  see  him  once  more 
before  his  departure.  The  day  had  not  advanced  far 
before  these  friends  began  to  appear  in  response  to  the 
summons.  His  manner  with  them  all  was  rather  that 
of  a  man  receiving  visitors  before  a  long  voyage  than 
that  of  an  ordinary  dying  man.  He  spoke  with  them 
about  going  to  the  heavenly  land  in  just  the  same 
natural  tone  in  which  he  had  spoken  of  it  during  all  his 
illness  to  his  children  and  other  kinsfolk,  as  he  would  have 
spoken  of  going  to  a  new  house,  or  visiting  Martha's 
Vineyard  for  rest  and  enjoyment.  A  few  indispensable 
matters  of  business  were  attended  to  and  certain  general 
directions  given.  Something  was  said  about  his  great 
love  for  New  England,  and  he  was  reminded  thereby  to 
tell  how  a  brother  Bishop  had  once  chaffed  him  over 
this  trait,  "  Bishop  Harris  said  at  the  last  Bishops'  meet- 
ing, '  If  a  man  were  wanted  to  fill  the  position  of  an 


502  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

archangel,  Haven  would  be  ready  to  look  him  up  in 
New  England.'  To  which  I  answered,  '  And  the  best 
of  it  would  be,  that  I  should  find  him,  too.'  "  His  mind 
was  clear  as  a  sunbeam,  all  his  faculties  in  the  most  perfect 
play,  and  there  was  nothing  but  his  physical  weakness  to 
make  him  seem  other  than  had  been  his  wont,  except 
that  his  voice  was  somewhat  husky  at  times,  rendering 
his  utterance  indistinct.  The  glory  of  God  filled  the 
room,  but  a  softened,  not  an  awful  glory  such  as  makes 
men  speechlessly  afraid. 

As  one  friend  after  another  came  in  for  the  final 
leave-taking,  all  sorts  of  reminiscences  were  called  up  by 
their  presence.  Politics,  reminiscences  of  other  scenes 
and  friends,  camp-meetings,  editorial  experiences,  parish 
enterprises,  and  some  joint  jocular  adventures  and  amus- 
ing scenes  turned  up  in  this  review,  mixed  up,  as  they  had 
been  in  life,  with  sad  farewells,  prayerful  ejaculations, 
tender  pressures  of  the  hand,  exultant  halleluias,  and 
cheerful  partings. 

When  dear  Fales  Henry  Newhall,  his  college  class- 
mate, member  of  the  "  Triangle,"  who  was  at  his  side 
when  his  Mary  was  buried,  came  into  the  room,  the 
scene  was  extremely  moving.  Those  who  sent  the  invi- 
tation to  him  had  doubts  of  the  propriety  of  risking  the 
peril  of  the  interview  for  the  broken  and  feeble  man. 
But  it  was  sent,  and  he  came.  God  graciously  sus- 
tained this  stricken  friend,  and  the  conversation  was  so 
full  of  sweetness  and  light  that  he  seemed  greatly  like 
himself  at  his  best  estate.  Their  talk  ran  back  over  the 
past,  and  was  as  cheerful  as  sunrise. 


Failing  Health.  503 

You  used  to  get  ahead  of  me  in  other  days,"  refer- 
ring to  the  fact  that  the  visitor  was  second  scholar  in  the 
class  where  the  Bishop  was  third,  but  I  have  beaten 
you  just  a  little  this  time.  I  thought  you  would  have 
gone  before  me."  Alluding  to  a  severe  affliction  under 
which  his  friend  was  suffering  he  said,  "  There  has  been 
a  little  darkness  over  you,  but  there  is  light  ahead." 

Toward  the  close  of  their  interview  the  Bishop  asked 
Dr.  Newhall  to  pray  with  him.  With  a  child-like  look 
of  surprise  the  friend  turned  to  Hannah  Haven,  the 
Bishop's  sister,  asking,  Shall  I  ?  "  and  on  her  saying, 
"  Yes,  if  you  feel  like  it,"  he  knelt  down  and  poured  out 
his  soul  in  prayer.  Not  a  jarring  phrase,  word,  or  tone 
marred  the  touching  beauty  of  his  supplication,  and  he 
was  as  one  who  sees  "  heaven  open  and  the  angels  of 
God  ascending  and  descending." 

When  Dr.  Mallalieu  arrived,  with  whom  he  had  been 
for  years  on  terms  of  the  greatest  intimacy,  who  had 
done  more  than  any  other  to  make  him  Bishop,  and 
whose  sympathy  for  his  most  radical  notions  was  com- 
plete, he  said,  "  My  dear  brother,  you  and  I  would  not 
have  this  so,  but  it  is  all  right ;  God  knows  best.  We 
have  been  living  in  great  times.  But  greater  times  are 
coming.  Stand  by  the  colored  man  when  I  am  gone. 
I  know  the  Lord  will  not  find  fault  with  me  for  my  work 
in  the  South."  The  like  regard  for  the  people  of  color 
shone  out  in  his  directions  about  the  funeral :  "  Let  some 
of  my  colored  friends  help  also  to  carry  me  to  my  grave, 
and  have  Rev.  John  N.  Mars  speak  at  my  funeral." 
Mr.  Mars  was  a  venerable  colored  clergymen  whom  the 


504  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

Bishop  got  admitted  to  the  New  England  Conference 
in  times  when  such  an  act  meant  more  than  it  does 
now. 

A  friend  drew  near  the  dying  saint  and  whispered 
some  message  inaudible  to  the  company,  but  he  shouted 
out,  "Halleluia!  Praise  the  Lord!"  Again  there  was 
another  whispered  utterance  in  the  patient's  ear,  and 
he  cried  out,  "  Glory  to  God ! "  These  responses 
led  to  the  conjecture  that  some  peculiarly  affecting  pas- 
sages of  Scripture  had  been  spoken  in  their  communi- 
cations. But  it  was  soon  known  that  he  was  announc- 
ing a  generous  donation  to  the  funds  of  one  of  the 
Southern  colleges  in  which  the  Bishop's  interest  was  so 
keen  to  the  last.  The  second  shout  was  called  out  by 
the  statement  that  there  would  be  more  to  come," 
for  the  same  cause  thereafter.  It  is  safe  to  say  that 
hardly  any  thing  could  have  been  more  in  harmony  with 
his  whole  conduct  toward  the  colored  people  than  this 
dying  shout  over  larger  educational  privileges  for  them. 

To  a  relative,  Mr.  O.  B.  Brown,  a  professor  of  music, 
he  said,  calling  him  by  his  initials,  as  usual,  "  O.  B.,  I 
am  glad  you  came.  '  And  they  that  play  on  stringed 
instruments  shall  be  there.'  Music  was  first  made  in 
heaven.  I  will  meet  you  there."  And  to  Dr.  Sawtelle, 
who  wonderingly  confessed  that  he  had  never  before 
had  such  a  patient  or  witnessed  such  a  death-bed,  "  I 
have  not  preached  this  faith  all  my  life  to  be  deprived 
of  its  consolations  .now.  My  hopj  is  a  blessed  one,  and 
big  with  immortality." 

As  the  day  wore  onward  he  remarked  that  he  had 


Failing  Health.  505 

that  morning  sent  for  Dr.  Garratt,  who  had  engaged  to 
come  at  four  o'clock  that  afternoon.  "  You  will  coun- 
termand the  order  to  Dr.  Garratt ;  I  have  no  need  of 
him.  I  am  going  where  the  inhabitants  shall  never  say, 
*  I  am  sick.'  " 

To  his  friend  Dr.  Upham  he  said  :  "  Preach  a  whole 
Christ,  a  whole  Gospel,  a  whole  heaven,  a  whole  hell,  a 
whole  Bible."  To  another  he  said,  Stand  by  the  old 
Church."  And  to  yet  another  he  said,  "  The  first  Sun- 
day of  the  new  year  I  shall  spend  in  glory," 

Over  and  over  again  during  the  day  he  would  repeat 
the  Scripture  to  himself,  He  shall  never  see  death." 
The  meaning  of  that  text  seemed  now  to  come  home  to 
his  heart,  as  if  for  the  first  time.  The  Holy  Comforter 
was  present,  translating  that  divine  word  into  a  new 
and  living  experience  every  moment,  so  that,  filled  with 
its  unutterable  grace,  he  kept  breaking  out  with,  Praise 
the  Lord !  "  Again  he  said  :  "  I  see  no  dark  river.  I 
am  entering  the  gates  of  paradise.  Now  I  know  what 
the  Book  means  when  it  says,  '  He  shall  never  see  death.' 
There  is  no  death  here,  it  is  all  glory,  glory." 

That  glory  was  so  near  and  certain  to  his  purified 
vision  that  he  spoke  of  it  as  people  talk  of  long-famil- 
iar possessions.  A  widowed  sister  had  conversed  with 
him  about  a  personal  message  she  had  charged  him  with 
for  her  husband,  his  brother  Wilbur.  She  now  said  re- 
mindingly : 

Gilbert,  you  know  what  I  told  you  to  tell  Wilbur  ?  " 

Yes,"  was  the  response,    I  will  remember  it  all,  and 

deliver  your  message." 
22 


5o6  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

Presently  he  said:  "It  is  so  delightful  dying — it  is 
so  pleasant — so  beautiful — the  angels  are  here — God 
lifts  me  up  in  his  arms.  I  cannot  see  the  river  of  death 
— there  is  no  river — it  is  all  light — I  am  floating  away 
from  earth  up  into  heaven  —  I  am  just  gliding  over  into 
God."  To  Dr.  Peirce  he  said :  "  I  have  not  a  cloud 
over  my  mind.  It  is  all  blessed.  I  know  whom  I  have 
believed.  I  believe  the  Gospel,  all  its  precious  truth,  all 
through." 

Then  occurred  the  interview  reported  by  Bishop  Fos- 
ter in  his  funeral  discourse :  "  As  I  held  his  hand  in 
mine,  when  my  heart  broke,  he  said,  *  Bishop,  I  love  you 
a  great  deal ; '  and  I  knew  it.  '  God  bless  you  I  God 
bless  all  my  colleagues  I  Give  them  all  my  love.  God 
bless  the  preachers  ! '  " 

About  four  o'clock  one  of  his  choice  friends  and 
lovers  entered  the  room,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Daniel  Steele. 
Grasping  his  hand,  he  exclaimed  joyfully :  "  O  Dan,  Dan, 
a  thousand,  thousand  blessings  on  you.  The  Lord  has 
been  giving  you  great  blessings  and  me  little  ones,  and 
now  he  has  given  me  a  great  one.  He  has  called  me 
to  heaven  before  you,  the  first  to  break  the  immortal 
*  Triangle.'  " 

Said  Steele,  "  Do  you  find  the  words  of  Paul  true,  *  O 
Death,  where  is  thy  sting? 

"  There  is  no  death,  there  is  no  death  I  I  have  been 
fighting  death  for  six  weeks,  and  to-day  I  find  there  is 
no  death,"  he  broke  out.  And  Steele  afterward  thought 
he  had  Longfellow's  immortal  stanza  in  mind  as  the 
best  expression  of  his  experience  : 


Failing  Health. 


507 


"  There  is  no  death  !  what  seems  so  is  transition  ; 

This  life  of  mortal  breath, 
Is  but  the  suburb  of  the  life  elysian, 

"Whose  portal  we  call  death." 

He  repeated  again  and  again  John  viii,  51  :  ''Shall 
never  see  death,  shall  never  see  death  !  "  Glory,  glory, 
glory  !  To  Steele's  remark,  "  You  have  a  great  Saviour," 
he  instantly  replied,  "  Yes,  that  is  the  whole  of  the  Gos- 
pel, the  whole  of  it."    He  then  with  some  difficulty  said  : 

"  Happy,  if  with  my  latest  breath 

I  may  but  gasp  his  name  ; 
Preach  Him  to  all,  and  cry  in  death. 

Behold,  behold  the  Lamb  ! " 

In  less  than  a  minute  he  had  an  opportunity  to  preach 
Him  by  a  testimony  to  his  power  to  save.  For  just 
then  his  consulting  physician  from  Boston  came  in  to 
bid  him  farewell.  Said  the  dying  Bishop,  as  he  reached 
out  his  left  hand,  (his  right  was  dead  and  black  from 
mortification,)  ''  I  am  satisfied  with  your  attentions ;  you 
have  done  all  that  human  skill  can  do  to  heal  me.  I  die 
happy.  I  believe  in  Jesus  Christ."  The  physician  made 
no  reply,  but  as  we  passed  down  stairs  he  said,  I  never 
saw  a  person  die  so  before." 

The  last  of  these  old  friends  to  reach  his  bedside  was 
Professor  Lindsay.  His  exhaustion  was  such  that  the 
visitor  made  a  short  stay,  and,  as  he  was  going,  the 
Bishop  made  the  apposite  remark,  "  Good  evening.  Dr. 
Lindsay.  When  we  next  meet  it  will  be  good  morn- 
ing." 

Throughout  the  day  he  had  more  than  once  inquired 


5o8  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

whether  telegrams  had  been  sent  to  Rev.  Dr.  G.  M. 
Steele,  Dr.  William  Rice,  and  the  writer,  and  whether 
any  answer  had  come.  On  Dr.  Lindsay's  departure  he 
said  to  the  family,  *'  Now  we  will  have  no  more  visitors 
from  the  outside,  only  if  Dr.  Steele,  Dr.  William  Rice,  or 
Professor  Prentice  should  appear,  let  them  be  shown  up 
at  once,  without  stopping  for  asking  leave."  So  clear 
was  his  mind  still,  and  so  perfectly  did  he  note  every 
absentee  of  those  he  longed  to  greet  and  bless  once 
more  with  a  loving  smile. 

These  directions  given,  he  said  :  **  Now  we  are  alone 
and  must  have  a  little  time  with  our  own  family.  Here 
are  my  two  sisters,  my  two  children.  Where  is 
mother?"  When  she  was  led  in,  they  all  stood  in  a 
circle  around  the  bed  so  that  he  might  see  them  all. 
But  dimness  of  vision  was  now  upon  him,  so  that,  after 
turning  his  eyes  around  the  group,  he  demanded,  "Are 
we  all  alone?  "  An  affirmative  answer  being  given,  he 
then  turned  his  thoughts  wholly  on  God  and  these  near- 
est and  best  beloved  of  his  kindred  on  earth.  Pressing 
their  hands  one  after  another  he  said  tenderly:  This  is 
my  dear,  dearest  mother;  Mamie,  my  little  sunbeam, 
dear,  pretty  one ;  Willie,  my  noble  son."  Throughout 
all  the  pauses  of  his  talk  he  murmured  and  whispered 
aloud  to  himself,  Precious  Jesus  ;  blessed  Jesus,"  as  if 
trying  to  link  the  sorrow  and  the  triumph  of  that  su- 
preme hour  to  the  supreme  Saviour.  Thus  Gilbert 
Haven  fell  on  sleep  January  3,  1880,  at  six  o'clock  in  the 
evening. 

Some  needless  ingenuity  has  been  exerted  to  account 


Failing  Health.  509 

for  the  fact  that  in  his  last  moments  he  did  not  mention 
his  beloved  Mary.  But  it  would  have  been  impossible 
for  him  to  have  mentioned  her  that  last  day  without 
departing  from  the  habit  of  a  score  of  years.  He  would 
mention  her  only  to  his  dearest  intimates,  and  never  to 
several  together,  though  possibly  once  or  twice  to  a 
congenial  friend  and  his  wife.  It  is  hard  to  conceive 
him  speaking  of  her  in  the  busy  train  of  that  wonderful 

reception."  When  the  family  were  at  last  alone,  he 
might  have  done  it  without  jarring  any  sense  of  "deli- 
cacy. But  his  failing  vision  shows  that  the  weakness  and 
torpor  of  death  were  pervading  his  senses,  and  perhaps 
clouding  his  mind.  That  he  did  not  think  of  her  is  im- 
possible. Probably  he  judged  it  best  to  devote  all  his 
attention  to,  and  lavish  all  his  love  upon,  the  dear  ones 
from  w^hom  he  was  even  then  parting.  What  had  she 
to  do  with  these  sorrowful  though  triumphant  scenes  of 
leave  taking  ?  Of  all  the  dear  kindred  he  had  lost  and 
the  noble  Christian  friends  who  had  gone  before  him  to 
that  realm  of  joy  he  mentioned  none,  because  he  was 
going  to  rejoin  them,  not  being  parted  from  them. 

When  Emerson  printed  in  the  ''Atlantic  Monthly" 
his  noble  poem  "  Terminus,"  it  chanced  that  Mr  Haven 
read  it  to  a  familiar  friend.  The  poem  strongly  im- 
pressed them  both.  Mr.  Haven  was  greatly  struck  with 
the  beauty  of  the  concluding  lines,  and  read  them  aloud  : 

"  As  the  bird  trims  him  to  the  gale, 
I  trim  myself  to  the  storms  of  time  ; 

I  man  the  rudder,  reef  the  sail, 

Obey  the  voice  at  eve  obeyed  at  prime, 


510  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

Lowly  faithful,  banish  fear, 

Right  onward  drive  unharmed, 
The  port  well  worth  the  cruise  is  near, 

And  every  wave  is  charmed." 

Mr.  Haven  said  that  the  spirit  breathing  through  the 
poem  is  purely  heathen,  no  higher  and  no  purer  than  the 
spirit  of  Plato's  Phaedo."  The  modern  pagan  seemed 
so  calm  and  poised  in  his  unbelief  that  his  admirer 
began  to  wonder  how  Emerson,  consciously  dying,  would 
pass  the  ordeal.  Then  he  spoke  of  his  own  life-long 
instinctive  dread  of  the  dying  hour,  not  of  being  dead 
or  of  the  experiences  of  the  future  state.  Yet  he  took 
refuge  in  the  conviction  that  holy  living  is  the  best  path- 
way to  a  happy  death,  though  his  fears  attended  him  up 
to  the  days  of  his  departure.  It  has  seemed  to  many  of 
his  friends  that  his  translation  so  that  he  should  not  see 
death  on  that  bright  winter  day  was  God's  gracious  ful- 
fillment to  Gilbert  Haven  of  the  ancient  Scripture : 
Fear  not  :  for  I  have  redeemed  thee,  I  have  called 
thee  by  thy  name  ;  thou  art  mine.  When  thou  passest 
through  the  waters  I  will  be  with  thee  ;  and  through  the 
rivers,  they  shall  not  overflow  thee  :  when  thou  walkest 
through  the  fire,  thou  shalt  not  be  burned  ;  neither  shall 
the  flame  kindle  upon  thee." 


The  Mourning  and  Burial.  511 


CHAPTER  XXII. 

THE  MOURNING  AND  BURIAL. 

The  General  Sorrow — Action  of  His  Associates — Funeral — The  Throngs — Bishop  Fos- 
ter's Address — The  Procession — Burial  Service — Graduated  with  Honor. 

THE  funeral  of  Bishop  Haven  took  place  at  Maiden, 
January  6,  1880.  When  the  fact  of  his  death  was 
generally  known  it  awakened  wide-spread  sorrow  and 
sympathy.  Resolutions  came  in  to  his  family  from  all  the 
various  organizations  with  which  he  had  been  connected, 
expressing  the  highest  appreciation  of  his  character  and 
services  in  the  various  positions  he  had  so  long  and 
honorably  filled,  the  universal  sentiment  of  the  great 
loss  the  Church  and  the  public  had  suffered  through  his 
death,  and  also  expressions  of  tender  sympathy  for  the 
bereaved  circle  of  mourning  kindred.  To  most  observ- 
ers there  seemed  to  be  an  unusual  reality  in  these  official 
utterances  of  sorrow,  for  all  who  had  ever  known  Mr. 
Haven  seemed  to  have  lost  a  friend. 

Business  was  generally  suspended  at  Maiden,  and 
large  throngs  of  citizens  attended  the  funeral  services. 
The  bells  of  all  the  different  churches  were  tolled  at 
proper  intervals  in  the  ceremonies.  The  very  atmos- 
phere of  the  town  seemed  sad  and  mournful.  An  Irish 
woman  expressed  the  emotions  of  her  fellow-Christians 
by  saying :  "  Sure  I  don't  see  what  more  we  could  do  if 
the  Pope  were  dead.    The  Catholics  are  all  standing 


512 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


around  the  streets  and  talking  about  hiin,  and  saying 
that  such  a  good  man  must  have  gone  to  heaven." 

At  the  old  home  a  dense  throng  of  kindred  and  friends 
filled  the  rooms  where  prayer  was  offered  by  Rev.  B.  K. 
Peirce,  D.D.,  in  very  tender  and  appropriate  terms.  The 
remains  were  then  removed  to  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church,  near  by,  for  the  more  public  ceremonies.  The 
decorations  of  the  church  were  simple  and  effective. 
The  organ,  choir  gallery,  and  pulpit  were  decorated  with 
festoons  of  black  and  white,  intertwined  with  smilax, 
with  interspersed  baskets  of  rare  flowers,  and  a  bunch 
of  calla  lilies  in  front  of  the  pulpit.  These  decorations 
were  furnished  by  the  Maiden  Church.  A  fine  oil  por- 
trait of  the  Bishop,  furnished  by  the  family,  draped  in 
mourning  and  surrounded  with  smilax,  was  suspended 
before  the  organ.  An  elegant  cross  of  ivy,  with  a  sheaf 
of  wheat  at  the  base,  was  presented  by  the  Bromfield 
Street  Church,  of  Boston.  A  wreath  of  lilies  of  the 
valley  and  ferns  was  sent  by  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Franklin 
Haven,  of  Mount  Vernon  Street,  Boston  ;  and  from  Mrs. 
Charles  Scott,  of  Philadelphia,  came  a  slab  of  pinks, 
bearing  the  device,  My  Father."  From  the  members 
of  the  Boston  Preachers'  Meeting  came,  set  in  a  rich 
tablet  of  flowers,  the  episcopal  seal,  with  its  striking 
inscriptions,  "  Preach  the  Word,"  and  "  Feed  my 
Lambs,"  inclosing  an  open  Bible.  At  the  center  of  the 
choir  rail  was  suspended  the  floral  tribute  of  the  Bishop's 
college  society  at  Wesleyan  University,  the  P/ii  Nu 
Theta,  of  which  he  was  always  an  honored  brother. 
The  scroll,  shaped  like  the  society's  badge,  was  made  of 


The  Mourning  and  Burial.  513 

carnations,  bearing  in  immortelles  the  inscription,  ' Eklek- 
tds,  Phi  Nu  Theta,  Wesleyait. 

The  spacious  church  was  densely  packed  with  the 
town's  people  and  strangers.  It  was  thought  that  more 
persons  failed  to  obtain  a  place  in  the  church  for  want 
of  room  than  were  present  there.  There  must  have 
been  nearly  three  hundred  Methodist  ministers  in  the 
vast  audience,  and  many  of  them  had  come  from  long 
distances  to  the  funeral. 

The  following  prominent  ministers  were  observed  in 
the  church  : 

Bishops  Harris  and  Foster;  Dr.  Cummings,  pastor  of 
the  Church  ;  A.  D.  Vail,  D.D.  ;  O.  H.  Tiffany,  D.D.;  John 
P.  Newman,  D.D. ;  Albert  S.  Hunt,  D.D.,  Secretary  of 
the  American  Bible  Society ;  D.  A.  Goodsell,  D.D. ; 
Lewis  R.  Dunn,  D.D.  ;  John  M.  Reid,  D.D.,  Secretary 
of  the  Missionary  Society;  William  Butler,  D.D. ;  D.  A. 
Whedon,  D.D.,  and  M.  J.  Talbot,  D.D.,  of  the  Provi- 
dence Conference  ;  A.  J.  Kynett,  D.D.,  and  Henry  W. 
Warren,  D.D.,  of  Philadelphia;  Cyrus  D.  Foss,  LL.D., 
President  of  Wesleyan  University ;  George  Prentice, 
D.D.,  Professor  in  Wesleyan  University;  J.  F.  Hurst, D.D., 
President  of  Drew  Theological  Seminary  ;  B.  K.  Peirce, 
D.D.,  editor  of  "  Zion's  Herald  ;"  Bishop  M'Namara,  a 
converted  Catholic  priest  ;  L.  R.  Thayer,  D.D.  ;  Mark 
Trafton,  D.D.  ;  Loranus  Crowell,  D.D.  ;  W.  F.  Malla- 
lieu,  D.D. ;  D.  Steele,  D.D. ;  S.  F.  Upham,  D.D. ;  C.  S. 
Rogers,  D.D.;.  D.  H.  Eia,  D.D.  ;  W.  R.  Clarke,  D.D. ; 
G.  M.  Steele,  D.D.  ;  W.  F.  Warren,  D.D.,  President  of 

Boston  University  ;  L.  T.  Townsend,  D.D.,  Professor  in 
22* 


514  Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 

Boston  University  ;  J.  H.  Tvvombly,  D.D. ;  F.  H.  New- 
hall,  D.D.  ;  D.  Dorchester,  D.D.  ;  W.  S.  Studley,  D.D. 
In  prominent  positions  among  their  brethren  sat  two 
colored  clergymen.  Rev.  J.  N.  Mars  and  Rev.  Mr. 
Snowden,  pastor  of  Revere  Street  Church,  in  Bcbston  ; 
for  Bishop  Haven  wished  his  funeral  to  proclaim  the 
same  truths  his  life  had  taught.  A  throng  of  clergymen 
from  the  different  New  England  Conferences  was  pres- 
ent. A  similar  throng  of  laymen  was  also  present  from 
these  Conferences.  "  The  VVesleyan  Association,"  which 
made  him  editor  of  "  Zion's  Herald,"  was  present  in  a 
body.  Among  the  laymen  from  abroad  were  noted 
James  H.  Taft,  Esq.,  of  Brooklyn,  N.  Y.  ;  J.  M.  Phillips, 
Esq.,  of  the  Book  Concern,  New  York;  J.  M.  Van  Vleck, 
LL.D,,  Professor  in  Wesleyan  University  ;  General  Clin- 
ton B.  Fisk,  of  Seabright,  N.  J.  ;  John  H.  Bentley,  Esq., 
of  Newark,  N.  J.  ;  and  George  J.  Ferry,  Esq.,  of  New 
Jersey;  William  M.  Ingraham,  Esq.,  Henry  C.  M.  In- 
graham,  Esq.,  Mrs.  Richard  Ingraham,  Miss  Jane  Ingra- 
ham. 

It  was  ten  minutes  past  twelve  when  Bishop  Foster 
met  the  procession  at  the  church  door,  and  solemnly 
pronounced  the  opening  sentences  of  the  Burial  Service 
as  the  remains  were  slowly  borne  through  the  densely 
crowded  church  and  deposited  on  the  dais  in  the  chan- 
cel by  the  following  pall-bearers  :  The  Rev.  Messrs.  L. 
R.  Thayer,  C.  S.  Rogers,  D.  H.  Ela,  W.  R.  Clarke,  D. 
Sherman,  W.  F.  Warren,  G.  M.  Steele,  L.  T.  Townsend, 
J.  H.  Twombly,  D.  Dorchester,  F.  H.  Newhall,  W.  S. 
Studley,  J.  N.  Mars;  the  Hon.  Jacob  Sleeper,  J.  P. 


The  Mournixg  and  Burial.  515 

Magee,  Esq.,  Hon.  E.  H.  Dunn,  G.  P.  Cox,  Esq.,  and 
H.  V.  jjilman,  Esq.  The  remains  were  inclosed  in  a  red 
cedar  casket,  overlaid  with  black  broadcloth,  heavily 
mounted  with  silver  rails  and  handles.  On  a  silver  plate 
was  the  inscription  :  Gilbert  Haven.  Born  September 
19,  1821.    Died  January  3,  1880." 

The  Bishop  lay  in  the  casket  turned  slightly  to  one 
side,  in  his  usual  dress  and  a  most  natural  attitude,  not 
a  sign  of  death  appearing  on  his  countenance.  He 
seemed  to  have  dropped  into  a  quiet  and  delightful 
slumber.  His  face  seemed  the  very  home  of  peace,  so 
perfect  the  calmness  which  it  expressed.  It  seemed  as 
if  he  must  hear  the  words  spoken  over  him  with  such 
tenderness  and  love. 

The  choir  then  chanted  Psalm  xc,  "  Lord,  thou  hast 
been  our  dwelling  place  in  all  generations."  The  Rev. 
John  W.  Hamilton,  of  Boston,  read  as  the  first  lesson 
Psalm  xxxix.  The  Rev.  Mark  Trafton,  D.D.,  then  read 
the  second  lesson  from  i  Cor.  xv.  ]n  the  prayer,  which 
was  next  offered  by  Rev.  Loranus  Crowell,  D.D.,  the 
immutability  of  God  and  the  mutability  of  man  were 
set  forth.  Gratitude  was  expressed  for  the  great  phys- 
ical, mental,  and  moral  endowments  of  the  deceased 
Bishop ;  for  the  consecrated  family  in  which  he  was 
reared  ;  for  his  early  conversion  to  Christ ;  for  the  zeal, 
piety,  purity,  and  devotion  that  adorned  his  life ;  for 
his  sympathy  with  the  lowly  and  oppressed  ;  for  all  he 
had  accomplished  in  the  Church  and  the  land  ;  that  he 
was  permitted  to  return  to  the  dear  old  home  before  his 
death  ;  for  his  steadfast  faith  ;  for  his  serene  peace  and 


5i6  Life  of  Gilbert  Havex. 

triumph  over  the  last  enemy;  for  the  glorious  assurance 
that  he  had  now  entered  a  mansion  in  the  Father's 
house  on  high,  and  received  a  welcome  to  the  home  of 
the  blessed.  Bereaved  friends  were  remembered  in  the 
most  affectionate  supplications,  and  especially  were  the 
aged  mother,  the  dear  children,  and  the  sisters  of  the 
dead  commended  to  the  loving  care  of  a  loving  God. 

A  hymn  was  then  read  by  Rev.  Mr.  Snowden,  (colored,) 
of  Boston  ;  a  touching  letter  was  read  by  Rev.  J.  W. 
Hamilton,  from  Rev.  William  Rice,  D.D.,  of  Springfield, 
a  life-long  friend  of  the  dead  Bishop.  Then  came,  as  the 
principal  address  of  the  service,  a  discourse  from  Bishop 
Randolph  S.  Foster,  D.D.,  a  gem,  which  reflects,  and 
will  ever  reflect,  equal  honor  on  the  speaker  and  on  the 
sleeping  friend  and  colleague  over  whom  it  was  spoken. 

ADDRESS  OF  BISHOP  FOSTER. 

Brothers,  we  stand  to-day  in  the  presence  of  a  great  sorrow,  in 
which,  I  am  sure,  if  we  could  follow  the  dictates  of  our  feelings,  si- 
lence and  tears  would  take  the  place  of  speech.  That  has  hap- 
pened to  us  which,  but  a  few  days  ago,  seemed  impossible  to  our 
affections. 

Bishop  Haven,  your  friend  and  mine,  is  dead.  His  body  lies  in 
the  hush  and  stillness  of  the  casket  before  the  chancel.  The  blow 
that  has  fallen  so  suddenly,  so  unexpectedly  even,  with  all  the  prep- 
aration we  had  for  it,  falls  not  alone  upon  New  England.  It  smites 
wide  and  deep  over  the  broad  surface  of  this  entire  land.  A  great 
Church  stands  mourner  here  to-day  at  this  bier — the  Church  at 
home,  the  Church  throughout  the  mission  fields  in  the  four  quarters 
of  the  globe.  Not  figuratively,  l)ut  literally,  hundreds  of  thousands 
join  the  obsequies  of  this  moment.  All  abroad,  among  the  different 
races  and  different  denominations  and  types  of  Christians,  there  is  a 


The  Mourning  and  Burial. 


517 


deep  sympathetic  sorrow  at  this  moment.  And  it  becomes  us,  how- 
ever difficult  the  task,  to  discipline  our  hearts  to  calmness,  and  our 
minds  to  acquiesce  in  this  strange  and  mysterious  providence. 

If  our  brother  has  gone  away  from  us,  we  are  called  to  remember 
to-day  that  it  was  his  Lord  and  our  Lord,  his  Master  and  our  Mas- 
ter, that  has  called  him  away. 

Mere  sullen  grief  or  idle  lament  would  ill  become  the  sacredness 
or  greatness  of  this  hour.  He  would  reprove  the  one,  and  the  great 
Master  would  reprove  the  other.  If  it  is  inevitable  that  we  should 
weep,  that  our  hearts  should  be  broken,  (and  there  are  many  broken 
hearts  here  to-day,)  it  is  just  and  right  and  worthy  that  our  words 
should  be  words  of  courage,  of  rejoicing,  and  of  triumph. 

Did  I  say,  Bishop  Haven  is  dead  ?  I  take  back  that  word  !  He 
is  not  dead  ;  he  can  never  die.  He  has  but  passed  on.  He  has 
vanished  from  the  house  where  we  knew  him  to  take  possession  of 
another  house,  "  not  made  with  hands,  eternal  in  the  heavens."  He 
has  surrendered  an  inferior  for  a  superior  life.  He  has,  indeed,  gone 
away,  and  we  shall  not  see  him  again — now.  We  shall  not  commu- 
nicate with  him  as  aforetime  upon  the  earth,  and  no  mortal  can  te'.l 
what  has  gone  out  of  earth  and  life  with  his  departure.  There  is  no 
mortal  who  can  tell  what  he  contributed  to  the  life  of  the  world,  and 
what  he  will  continue  to  contribute  to  the  life  of  the  world  to  the 
end  of  time.  For,  though  he  has  ceased  to  be  a  visible  factor,  his 
words,  his  thoughts,  his  deeds,  will  live  on  in  the  lives  and  charac- 
ters of  men  so  long  as  the  world  shall  stand.  For  Bishop  Haven 
was  no  ordinary  man.  ["  Amens  "  from  the  congregation.]  Among 
the  multitudes  he  was  an  inevitable  factor  of  great  power,  and  he 
was  a  consjDicuous  personality,  a  highly  individualized  man.  His 
life  has  cut  a  deep  impression  upon  the  souls  and  minds  of  men  in 
his  own  time,  and,  through  the  influence  exerted  now,  will  still  give 
impression  to  the  latest  generation  of  the  world. 

In  speaking  of  him  whom  you  loved  and  I  loved,  so  much  and  so 
rarely,  brothers  and  friends,  it  is  proper  that  I  should  consider  well 
the  words  I  am  speaking,  that  I  should  not  indulge  any  extravagant 
and  indiscriminate  eulogy  ;  that  I  should  not  draw  a  picture  unreal 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


of  the  dep;^rted,  but  one  that  will  stand  the  test  of  criticism  and 
awakened  admiration,  with  all  candid  and  honest  minds,  the  more 
perfectly  it  is  portrayed. 

It  is  not  for  me  to  speak  to-day,  and  you  will  not  expect  it,  in 
detail  of  his  life  and  of  his  childhood.  We  stand  in  the  very  shadow 
of  the  roof-tree  under  which  it  was  spent,  in  the  midst  of  the  peop!e 
who  knew  him  from  his  infancy  and  the  beginning  and  dawn  of 
his  manhood  to  his  departure  from  you.  It  is  not  for  me  to  speak 
of  his  early  school-life,  of  his  student  histor\^  His  classmates  and 
his  colleagues  fill  this  room.  Others  will  furnish  personal  reminis- 
cences that  relate  to  these  early  periods  of  his  formative  life.  You 
will  not  expect  me  to  speak  of  his  relations  to  you  in  his  early  minis- 
try, which  will  always  be  your  pride  and  joy  ;  nor  yet  of  that  growing 
power  which  placed  him  foremost  among  you  in  official  responsibil- 
ity as  the  editor  of  your  Church  paper.  Rather,  you  will  expect  me 
to  speak  of  those  things  which  are  more  immediately  related  to 
myself  and  my  colleagues  in  his  episcopal  office,  covering  the  last 
eight  years  of  his  life. 

Bishop  Haven,  I  have  said,  was,  in  a  remarkable  degree,  an  indi- 
viduality, a  personality.  It  was  impossible  that  he  should  be  present 
even  for  a  few  moments,  in  a  narrow  or  great  circle,  upon  the  plat- 
form on  an  important  occasion,  or  in  the  deliberative  councils  of  large 
assemblies,  or  anywhere  else,  without  making  himself  known  or  felt 
in  his  personality.  He  would  inevitably  and  irrepressibly  come  to 
the  front  in  the  revelation  of  his  own  inward  thought  and  life.  He 
was  by  nature  a  strange  contradiction,  a  radical  of  the  radicals,  a 
conservative  of  the  conservatives,  taking  the  extremest  views  and  pur- 
-  I  suing  the  most  radical  forms  of  expression  and  action  in  matters  in 
/  which  human  interests  were  at  stake,  where  justice  revolted,  and 
mterposed  itself  against  oppression  and  cruelty,  and  in  ever}'  form 
in  which  he  could  personally  affect  the  life  and  action  of  society.  In 
principle  he  was  as  fixed  as  the  eternal  mountains.  Conservative, 
even  beyond  what  seemed  to  be  demanded,  in  all  his  views  of  truth 
and  righteousness  he  was  established  upon  firm  and  unchangeable 
foundations. 


The  Mourning  and  Burial.  519 

He  entered  upon  the  period  of  his  active  life  in  the  most  eventful 
crisis  in  the  history  of  our  country — in  the  most  exciting  and  ardent 
period  of  New  England  life — in  the  midst  of  that  great  effort  which 
agitated  the  continent  and  world — the  contest  between  New  England 
antislaveryism  and  Southern  organized  pro-slaveryism.  By  instinct 
and  education,  and  the  atmosphere  in  which  he  was  born  and  reared, 
he  immediately,  even  in  the  formative  period  of  his  youth,  took  sides 
with  the  oppressed  against  the  oppressors.  While  yet  the  dews  of 
his  youth  were  upon  him  he  marched  boldly  to  the  front  in  that  great 
combat,  and  stood  in  the  narrow  circle  of  ten  or  twelve  of  the  chief 
men  whose  words  will  go  down  to  posterity.  It  is  not  saying  too 
much  of  Bishop  Haven  to  say  that  he  was  conspicuous  among  these 
champions,  and  that  his  words  were  the  most  telling  and  effective 
blows  ;  that  he  was  an  agitator,  a  disturber,  an  irrepressible  radical, 
until  the  Wrong,  which  was  the  agony  of  his  heart,  which  haunted 
him  and  made  his  life  wretched,  was  destroyed  from  the  face  of  the 
earth.  His  name  will  stand  high  in  the  records  of  that  great  contest 
to  the  end  of  the  world. 

And  it  was  given  to  him  to  be  and  to  do  what  was  denied  all  his 
peers  and  colaborers ;  even  the  most  distinguished  of  them— those 
who  spoke  the  profoundest  words,  and  who,  by  tongue  and  pen,  con- 
tributed most  largely  to  the  result  which  was  finally  accomplished— 
were  not  permitted,  like  our  dear  Bishop,  in  the  history  of  their  lives, 
to  work  such  a  work  as  was  given  him  to  perform,  and  to  give  such 
evidences  of  fidelity  and  courage  to  the  cause  which  seemed  to  be 
the  cause  of  their  hearts  as  he  was  permitted  to  give. 

Genial  in  a  wonderful  degree,  generous,  greathearted,  cheerful  amid 
all  circumstances  of  depression  and  of  trial,  witty,  educated,  full  of 
knowledge,  full  of  the  life  of  the  world  from  its  beginning,  peculiarly 
and  uniquely  rich  in  his  acquaintance  with  the  men  of  his  own  time, 
with  the  history  of  his  own  country,  with  the  influences  which  were 
every-where  molding  and  plowing  up  society,  with  an  unforgetting 
memory,  with  a  vivid  power  of  perception,  with  great  imagination,  with 
strong  self-assertion,  with  irrepressible  love  of  justice  and  liberty,  he 
was  a  power  in  every  place,  and  will  be  a  power  forever.  ["Amens."] 


520 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


It  is  safe  to  say  that  when  he  entered  upon  the  General  Confer- 
ence of  1872,  already  rich  with  an  honorable  fame,  specially  loved 
and  esteemed  in  New  England,  specially  despised  and  hated  in  the 
South,  with  questions  of  doubt  and  misgiving  in  the  mind  of  the 
middle  country — when  he  entered  upon  the  General  Conference  of 
1872,  to  be  a  conspicuous  member  of  that  important  body  in  its 
most  important  session  in  the  history  of  the  Church— it  is  safe  to  say 
that  the  thought  had  never  entered  the  larger  part  of  the  Methodist 
mind  that  in  Gilbert  Haven  there  was  a  future  Bishop  of  the  Church  ; 
that,  whatever  was  the  judgment  of  those  who  stood  nearest  to  him, 
who  knew  him  best  and  loved  him  most,  he  would  go  away  from 
that  great  gathering  clothed  with  episcopal  honors  and  with  epis- 
copal responsibilities.  Beyond  all  question  his  election  was  a  sur- 
prise to  the  Church,  and  his  well-known  and  pronounced  radicalism 
for  so  long  a  time,  and  of  so  conspicuous  a  type,  the  readiness  and 
promptness  with  w^hich  he  always  propounded  his  convictions,  (for 
he  had  the  bravery  of  his  convictions;  he  could  not  conceal  them 
even  on  occasions  when  prudence  would  seem  to  require  that  they 
should  be  in  abeyance,)  it  is  safe  to  say  that  his  election  was  not 
only  a  surprise,  but  it  awakened  a  question  and  doubt  in  many  of  the 
purest  and  best  and  greatest  minds  whether  it  was  wise  and 
judicious. 

Thank  God  !  he  lived  for  eight  years  to  demonstrate  the  wisdom 
of  that  action.  ["Glory  to  God  !  "  and  "Amen,"  by  many  voices.] 
He  has  furnished  the  proof  that  it  was  no  mistake  or  misjudgment, 
that  Providence,  which  so  strongly  presided  over  the  destiny  of  our 
Church  and  to  so  large  an  extent,  governed  and  controlled  in  a  mat- 
ter of  so  great  a  moment.  There  was  a  full  exhibition  of  divine 
selection. 

As  a  Bishop,  our  colleague  became  greatly  endeared  to  the  entire 
Board,  winning,  session  by  session,  year  by  year,  upon  every  heart 
in  the  College,  until  I  am  safe  in  saying  in  the  presence  of  my  re- 
vered colleague,  [Bishop  Harris,]  that  he  stood  in  our  love  and  in 
our  confidence,  in  the  very  front,  and  had  developed  peculiar  adapta- 
tions where  we  did  not  expect  to  find  them,  for  the  office  which  he 


The  Mourning  and  Burial. 


521 


filled  with  so  great  honor  and  to  so  great  acceptation,  carrying  to 
the  chair  of  the  Conference  a  reserved  force  of  dignity  which  made 
him  a  model  presiding  officer,  familiar  with  the  questions  that  might 
arise  in  the  body,  a  ready  and  acute  judge  of  law ;  holding  the  Con- 
ferences in  whatever  excitement,  in  whatever  discussion,  in  calm, 
unperturbed  equipoise  ;  maintaining  order  and  discipline  to  a  high 
degree;  carrying  nothing  of  radical  or  extreme  or  injudicious  rash- 
ness into  his  administration  ;  impressing  the  humblest  member  of 
the  body  with  a  sense  of  the  equality  of  his  rights,  and  maintaining 
them. 

In  the  Cabinet  he  was  a  careful  and  earnest  student  of  the  inter- 
ests of  the  Churches,  and  of  the  interests  of  the  preachers.  We 
know  that  he  was  a  great  friend ;  that  friendship,  personal  love, 
glowed  in  his  heart  like  a  sun  ;  that  whom  he  once  loved  he  never 
could  forget  ;  that  he  carried  an  elect  circle  closest  in  the  inner 
sanctuary  of  his  soul,  never  forgetting  them  in  his  wide  wanderings, 
and  always  anxious  for  them.  But  we  know  this,  too,  that  he  had 
this  peculiarity,  that  while  he  studied  to  do  all  in  his  power  for  those 
he  had  known' longest  and  loved  best,  he  was  careful  to  consider  his 
most  recent  friends,  and  he  would  not  permit  an  injustice  to  be  done 
— for  that  was  a  conspicuous  attribute  of  Bishop  Haven's  character 
— a  sense  of  fairness,  a  sense  of  right,  that  sent  him  into  the  defense 
of  the  defenseless,  and  made  him  strong  in  the  cause  of  the  op- 
pressed. That  sense  of  justice  made  him  equal  and  honest  in  the 
administration  of  his  office. 

In  the  important  bodies  with  which  we  are  connected  in  our  office 
it  is  not  doing  discredit  to  any  of  his  colleagues  to  say  that  he  was 
most  far-seeing,  most  enterprising,  most  effective  in  devices  for  the 
enlargement  and  expansion  of  the  Church,  and  most  courageous  and 
most  alive  to  every  great  and  grand  movement.  No  mission-field 
failed  to  elicit  his  interest,  and  he  was  especially  concerned  and 
greatly  potent  in  the  affairs  of  the  Mexican  Mission,  in  planting  and 
protecting  and  defending  and  extending  the  interests  of  these  mis- 
sions. 

In  the  administration  of  the  missionary  branch  of  the  Church  his 


522 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


counsels  were  heard  reverently  always.  Sometimes  his  views  were 
^  in  advance  of  his  times,  and  extravagant  in  the  estimation  of  his 
brethren  ;  but  he  had  this  marked  peculiarity,  that  I  have  found  in 
no  other  man,  that  while  he  had  the  bravery  to  put  forth  any  judg- 
ment, any  opinion,  in  any  presence,  anywhere,  in  the  most  pro- 
nounced and  positive  manner,  he  never  became  troubled,  or  reserved, 
or  disturbed,  or  angered  by  its  not  being  accepted.  If  his  measure 
failed,  he  quietly  smiled  and  let  it  pass,  to  bring  it  up  again.  It  was 
sure  to  be  brought  up,  and  in  an  unexpected  moment,  when  he 
would  awaken  a  smile  upon  the  faces  of  those  who  were  most  de- 
lighted with  his  pertinacity,  it  would  come  out,  again  and  again, 
until  it  finally  triumphed,  and  all  said  his  advice  and  action  were 
wise  and  judicious,  though  at  first  they  may  have  thought  them  un- 
wise and  injudicious. 

I  have  seen  Bishop  Haven — I  dare  not  say  where,  I  dare  not  say 
when,  I  dare  not  say  how — when  any  other  man  would  have  burned 
with  indignation,  when  he  was  as  calm  and  placid  as  a  May  morn- 
ing. Loving  his  friends  with  an  intensity  of  love,  I  have  heard  it 
said  that  he  had  the  power  of  hate.  I  never  saw  it.  I  never  found 
the  occasion  when  he  indicated  even  against  those  who  seemed  to  have 
wronged  him,  and  most  persistently  to  have  evil  entreated  and  ob- 
structed him — I  never  saw  the  indication  of  the  slightest  ill-will  or 
malice  ;  constantly  forgetting,  he  would  pass  by  offenses  that  would 
certainly  overthrow  all  power  of  self-government  that  grace  or  nat- 
ure has  ever  given  me,  I  am  glad  to  speak  of  this  noble  and  won- 
derful trait  of  his  character. 

And  I  now  recur  (for  I  am  reminded  that  my  time  is  nearly 
passed,  that  others  are  entitled  to  speak  upon  this  occasion)  to  the 
one  great  trait,  the  love  of  his  life,  his  interest  in  and  love  for  the 
African  race— not  because  they  were  Africans,  not,  in  my  judgment, 
because  they  were  black — but  because  they  were  oppressed,  [great 
sensation,]  because  they  were  downtrodden,  because  they  were 
friendless  ;  and  he  had  the  bravery  to  stand  for  their  defense  any- 
where and  every-where,  and  at  times,  carrying  what  sometimes  to  us 
seemed  to  be  almost  a  fanaticism,  a  frenzy,  but  which  proved  to  be 


The  Mourning  and  Burial. 


523 


a  divine  passion  glowing  in  liis  soul,  carrying  it  up  to  the  gates  of 
death,  and  making  it  survive  him  on  this  very  platform. 

It  was  Bishop  Haven  that  said,  *'  Father  Mars  must  speak  at  my 
funeral;  some  colored  man  must  be  a  pall-bearer;"  going  person- 
ally to  show  that  this  love  was  strong  and  triumphant  in  him  to  the 
very  last  moment  of  his  life,  and  bequeathing  it  as  a  heritage  to  the 
Church. 

Bishop  Haven  was  loved  in  New  England,  loved  wherever  Method- 
ism is  known,  loved  by  the  generous  and  brave  of  the  entire  land,  loved 
by  a  wide  circle  all  over  the  world,  with  honor — a  noble  character. 
Never  was  one  so  especially  hated  and  odious  in  the  region  where  he 
lived,  (in  the  South ;)  and  I  refer  to  it,  not  to  call  up'an  unpleasant 
recollection,  nor  refer  to  what  is  grievous  to  us  all,  but  to  speak  of 
the  conspicuous  peculiarity  of  his  character,  his  great,  brave,  un- 
flinching courage  in  the  midst  of  the  greatest  trial.  There  was  not 
one  of  us,  in  our  Board,  that  did  not  feel  many  times  that  Bishop 
Haven  went  into  his  Southern  home  at  the  peril  of  his  life  ;  that  any 
day  it  would  have  been  no  surprise  to  hear  that  he  had  fallen  in  that 
field.  We  knew  that  he  went  there  with  that  feeling  himself.  And 
he  stood  like  an  iron  wall,  firm,  unflinching,  uncompromising,  pro- 
nouncing in  Charleston,  in  Atlanta,  in  New  Orleans,  in  the  hot- 
test and  fiercest  furnaces  of  Southern  sentiment,  with  the  same  pla- 
cidity and  boldness  in  deliverance,  the  ver>'  words  he  would  speak 
in  the  Preachers'  Meeting  in  Boston,  joining  hands  with  the  op- 
pressed race — I  am  glad  to  say  here,  not  in  a  manner  degrading  or 
discreditable  or  dishonorable  to  himself,  but  creditable  to  his  piety 
and  charity  and  great  sense  of  justice,  making  himself  the  acquaint- 
ance and  friend  of  the  colored  people  every-where  wherever  he  went. 
So  that  I  am  safe  in  saying,  among  the  few  names  of  the  generation 
passed  away  that  have  cut  themselves  deepest  in  the  African  mind 
and  African  heart,  and  that  will  live  the  longest,  and  among  the  few 
names  at  the  front,  will  be  the  name  of  Bishop  Haven,  along  with 
the  name  of  Abraham  Lincoln.  [Sensation.]  They  will  always  re- 
member him  as  their  defender  and  friend. 

I  happened  to  be  present  at  a  moment  when  he  said  to  a  bosom 


5^4 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


friend,  and  one  that  stands  nearest  to  him,  "  I  know,"  (it  was  less 
than  three  hours  before  his  spirit  stood  before  the  throne,)  "  I  know 
the  Lord  will  not  find  fault  with  me  for  my  work  in  the  South." 
He  carried  that  conviction  with  him  to  the  throne  of  God,  that  in 
the  sincere  devotion  of  his  soul  to  that  great  branch  of  our  Church 
work,  he  would  not  only  have  the  approval  of  the  Church,  but  of 
God. 

But  I  may  not  enlarge  further  on  this  important  branch  of  his 
life,  nor,  indeed,  upon  any  thing  further. 

He  has  gone  from  us  !  We  shall  not  see  him  any  more  now  !  To 
some  of  you  he  was  more  than  a  brother ;  to  all  of  us  he  was  a 
brother.  Shall  we  crown  him  to  day?  Shall  we  turn  this  moment 
of  mourning  and  grief  into  triumph  ?  Shall  we  rejoice  in  his  great 
light  ? 

May  I  say,  in  this  presence,  there  is  not  an  act  of  his  life  that 
I  can  call  to  memory,  and  not  a  word  even,  that  now,  in  the  light 
of  his  victorious  and  triumphant  departure,  I  would  have  erased  from 
his  record  !  Let  it  stand  there  in  its  fullness  !  Let  those  who  will 
criticise,  criticise  !  To  us  it  is  a  joy  forever  that  Gilbert  Haven  has 
lived  in  the  world  !  that  he  has  been  our  friend  and  brother  !  that 
he  has  filled  the  important  and  conspicuous  place  that  he  has  in 
the  history  of  the  Church,  and  in  his  great  episcopal  position  ! 

Glory  be  to  God  that  his  life  was  permitted  to  go  out  in  brightness, 
not  in  darkness  !  I  presume  that  it  was  the  first  time  in  forty  years 
— maybe  the  only  time  in  forty  years  (it  was  when  he  was  dying) — 
that  he  shouted  ! 

I  sat  by  his  bed  when,  after  many  beautiful  sayings,  some  of  which 
will  be  quoted  by  those  who  speak,  he  said,  looking  up,  "  Glory, 
glory,  glory  ! "  having  reserved  to  him  for  the  last,  for  the  completed 
and  victorious  triumph  over  his  latest  foe,  a  shout  of  victory! 

He  has  gone  home  !  I  will  not  stop  to  give  you  the  lessons  that 
come  to  us,  brothers.  Bishop  Haven  was  a  Methodist.  He  was  no 
bigot.  He  was  positive.  He  was  a  Methodist  in  every  atom  of  his 
consciousness  !  He  loved  his  Church.  He  loved  its  order.  It  was 
not  an  unchangeable  order.    It  was  not  an  idol.    But  he  loved  its 


The  Mourning  and  Burial. 


525 


order,  and  he  loved  its  prosperity.  He  loved  in  his  heart  of  hearts 
its  doctrines.  He  could  not  conceive  of  the  possibility,  for  himself, 
of  changing  them  in  their  expression.  He  accepted  them  in  their 
simplicity.  He  was  a  Methodist.  He  was  a  great,  generous-hearted 
Christian. 

As  I  held  his  hand  in  mine,  when  my  heart  broke,  he  said, 
'Bishop,  I  love  you  a  great  deal,"  and  I  knew  it.  "  God  bless  you  ! 
God  bless  my  colleagues  !  give  them  all  my  love  !  God  bless  the 
preachers !  God  bless  everybody !  "  It  was  the  utterance  of  the 
great,  glorious,  but  now  glorified  heart,  that  has  passed  into  the 
heavens. 

Brief  additional  addresses  were  made  by  Rev.  Messrs. 
Upham,  Mallalieu,  D.  Steele,  Mars,  and  Prentice.  The 
concluding  prayer  was  offered  by  Rev.  Dr.  Cummings. 
The  funeral  procession  was  at  once  formed  to  attend  the 
remains  to  their  resting  place  in  the  Salem  Street  Ceme- 
tery. All  the  clergymen  present  marched  on  foot  at 
the  head  of  the  train,  while  behind  the  hearse  followed 
a  long  line  of  sorrowful  relatives  and  friends.  At  the 
burial  place  Bishop  Harris  read  the  Burial  Service  over 
the  spot  where  Gilbert  and  Mary  Haven  sleep  in  joyful 
hope  of  the  resurrection.  And  so  at  last  Gilbert  Haven 
was,  as  his  own  phrase  ran,  graduated  with  honor. 

Once  when  talking  of  the  deepest  hopes  and  fears 
which  agitate  the  human  spirit  he  was  comforted  great- 
ly as  a  friend  read  aloud  Dr.  Newman's  Dream  of 
Gerontius."  It  moved  him  deeply,  especially  the  con- 
versation of  the  released  soul  with  the  attendant  angel. 
The  words  flashed  back  upon  the  same  friend  as  he  first 
looked  upon  the  face  of  Gilbert  Haven  in  the  strange 
immobility  of  death.    Thinking  of  him  now  that  friend^ 


526 


Life  of  Gilbert  Haven. 


ventures,  he  trusts  without  presumption,  to  write  them 
here  : 

Soul. 

Dear  Angel,  say, 
Why  have  I  now  no  fear  of  meeting  Him  ? 
Along  my  earthly  life,  the  thought  of  death 
And  judgment  was  to  me  most  terrible. 
I  had  it  aye  before  me,  and  I  saw 
The  Judge  severe  e'en  in  the  Crucifix. 
Now  that  the  hour  is  come,  my  fear  is  fled ; 
And  at  this  balance  of  my  destiny, 
Now  close  upon  me,  I  can  forward  look 
With  a  serenest  joy. 

Angel. 

It  is  because 

Then  thou  didst  fear,  that  now  thou  dost  not  fear; 

Thou  hast  forestalled  the  agony,  and  so 

For  thee  the  bitterness  of  death  is  past. 

Also,  because  already  in  thy  soul 

The  judgment  is  begun.    That  day  of  doom, 

One  and  the  same  for  the  collected  world — 

That  solemn  consummation  for  all  flesh, 

Is,  in  the  case  of  each,  anticipate 

Upon  his  death;  and,  as  the  last  great  day 

In  the  particular  judgment  is  rehearsed. 

So  now,  too,  ere  thou  comest  to  the  Throne, 

A  presage  falls  upon  thee,  as  a  ray 

Straight  from  the  Judge,  expressive  of  thy  lot. 

That  calm  and  joy  uprising  in  thy  soul 

Is  first-fruit  to  thee  of  thy  recompense, 

And  heaven  begun. 


THE  END. 


Date  Due 



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IN  U.  S.  A. 

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